Awareness Month in October

Add Medication Label Safety to your social media, community outreach and events planning for October to help spread awareness and availability of accessible prescription labeling options like audible, large print, Braille and translated prescription labels. For more outreach ideas and campaign information visit the Medication Label Safety Awareness Campaign website.

Acceso Lingüístico en Las Farmacias sponsored by En-Vision America

On July 12, 2022 En-Vision America sponsored a virtual seminar on language access in the pharmacy spoken in Spanish. Cynthia Velazquez from En-Vision America and Macarena Pena, a member of the National Federation of the Blind of Texas and employee of the Texas Workforce Commission Blind Services, share about translated prescription label technology in both audible and large print formats. Watch the entire presentation in Spanish! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LE7pPtXBgUE

Tennessee Law Requires Accessible Prescription Labeling

The volunteer state has stepped forward to become the third state to passed a law to require accessible prescription labels for the blind and visually impaired. The law instructs the Board of Pharmacy to "promulgate all necessary rules and regulations to ensure that an individual who is blind, visually impaired, or otherwise print disabled have appropriate access to prescription labels, bag tags, and medical guides."

The National Federation of the Blind Tennessee affiliate presented strong arguments and moving testimony as to why this legislation is needed. This law will also allow more people than just the blind to benefit from these new rules and regulations.. Conditions such as dyslexia, stroke, vestibular issues and illiteracy can all create print disabilities which could be accommodated by accessible prescription labels.

The Tennessee Board of Pharmacy will engage in the rule making process which involves open public meetings and stakeholder meetings to get feedback.

Tennessee Board of Pharmacy Meeting Schedule: https://www.tn.gov/health/calendar.pharmacy.html

Tennessee Board of Pharmacy Meeting Minutes: https://www.tn.gov/health/health-program-areas/health-professional-boards/pharmacy-board/pharmacy-board/meeting-minutes.html

World Health Organization Announces

World Patient Safety Day 2022

Theme: Medication Without Harm

September 17, 2022

Objectives of World Patient Safety Day 2022

RAISE global awareness of the high burden of medication-related harm due to medication errors and unsafe practices, and ADVOCATE urgent action to improve medication safety.
ENGAGE key stakeholders and partners in the efforts to prevent medication errors and reduce medication-related harm.
EMPOWER patients and families to be actively involved in the safe use of medication.
SCALE UP implementation of the WHO Global Patient Safety Challenge: Medication Without Harm. Working together to make health care safer

How to Participate

The global campaign for World Patient Safety Day 2022 proposes a wide range of activities for all key stakeholders on and around 17 September 2022, including development of national campaigns, organization of policy forums, advocacy and technical events, capacity-building initiatives and, as in previous years, lighting up iconic monuments, landmarks and public places in orange (the signature mark of the campaign).

WHO encourages all stakeholders to join the global campaign and adopt the WHO Global Patient Safety Challenge: Medication Without Harm in their efforts to implement the Global Patient Safety Action Plan 2021–2030.

We request you to share information about your plans to celebrate World Patient Safety Day 2022 https://extranet.who.int/dataformv3/index.php/368468?lang=en

For more information about the campaign and proposed activities, please visit the WHO World Patient Safety Day 2022 event page https://www.who.int/news-room/events/detail/2022/09/17/default-calendar/world-patient-safety-day-2022/

We encourage you to share best practices on the theme of Medication Safety that can be used in the run-up to and on World Patient Safety Day on patientsafety@who.int

Background on this Years Theme: Medication Without Harm

World Patient Safety Day is one of WHO’s global public health days. It was established in 2019 by the Seventy-second World Health Assembly through the adoption of resolution WHA72.6 – “Global action on patient safety”. Global public health days offer great potential to raise awareness and understanding of health issues and mobilize support for action, from the local community to the international stage. World Patient Safety Day is firmly grounded in the fundamental principle of medicine – first do no harm. Its objectives are to increase public awareness and engagement, enhance global understanding, and work towards global solidarity and action by Member States to promote patient safety.

Each year, a new theme is selected on a priority patient safety topic to highlight its importance and call for urgent action to address the issue. Unsafe medication practices and medication errors are a leading cause of avoidable harm in health care across the world. Medication errors occur when weak medication systems, and human factors such as fatigue, poor environmental conditions or staff shortages, affect prescribing, transcribing, dispensing, administration and monitoring practices, which can then result in severe patient harm, disability and even death. The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has significantly exacerbated the risk of medication errors and associated medication-related harm. Considering this huge burden of harm, “Medication Safety” has been selected as the theme for World Patient Safety Day 2022.

The theme builds on the ongoing efforts of the WHO Global Patient Safety Challenge: Medication Without Harm. It also provides much-needed impetus to take urgent action for reducing medication-related harm through strengthening systems and practices of medication use. The slogan of World Patient Safety Day 2022 “Medication Without Harm” aims to focus attention on making the process of medication safer and free from harm, and to galvanize action on the Challenge by calling on all stakeholders to prioritize medication safety and address unsafe practices and system weaknesses, with a special focus on the three main causes of avoidable harm arising from medication: high-risk situations, transitions of care and polypharmacy.

Accessibility will be one of the themes of the 2022 National Public Health Week. Each daily theme focuses on the inter-connectivity of the people and world around us. Improving the health of the many begins with improving the systems we have created and the earth we live on.

According to the American Public Health Association 26% of the population of the United States (61.4 million adults) live with a disability. Disability is especially common in tribal communities, where 2 in 5 non-Hispanic American Indians/Alaska Natives live with a disability.

Because of cost, over 37% of adults with disabilities have been unable to access primary and regular preventive care. Delayed care puts adults living with disabilities at greater risk to have other health issues like heart disease (11.5% versus 3.8% of adults without disabilities) and diabetes (16.3% versus 7.2%). Access to care is also affected by access to health insurance. In 2020, 28 million people in the U.S. lacked any type of health insurance."

National Public Health Week 2022 Themes

Racism: A Public Health Crisis (Monday)

Public Health Workforce: Essential to our Future (Tuesday)

Community: Collaboration and Resilience (Wednesday)

World Health Day: Health is a Human Right (Thursday)

Accessibility: Closing the Health Equity Gap (Friday)

Climate Change: Taking Action for Equity (Saturday)

Mental Wellness: Redefining the Meaning of Health (Sunday)

‘Empowering for patients’: Washington bill would require pharmacies to translate prescription information

By Amber D. Dodd

A bill that would require pharmacies across Washington to translate medical information, such as prescription bottle directions, passed out of committee this week and is awaiting a vote on the Senate floor.

The bill was crafted by medical students at the Washington State University Elson S. Floyd College of Medicine.

Aditha Vegaraju, Domeg Moore, Fatima Elwalid, Carmen Abbe, Bailey Hall and Aivi Tran spearheaded the research and writing of the bill. They are members of the Language Access Team from the regional chapter of Health Equity Circle, a student nonprofit with chapters in Spokane, Seattle, Portland, Denver and Laramie, Wyoming.

The goal of the bill is to “reduce harmful and costly medication errors” by requiring Washington pharmacies print prescription container labels in both English and “readable language for patients with limited English proficiency.”

In their proposed model, the vial will contain the standard information of the medicine’s name, directions of use and expiration dates.

After research and discussion with local organizations, the medical students drafted the bill in late August. Discussions with Atia Iqbal, an Afghan refugee and a coordinator at Refugee Connections Spokane, helped the team identify the cultural importance of passing the bill.

“She talked about how many women come to her, asking for help to translate prescriptions because they can’t ask the men in their family since it’s personally sensitive with medications,” Vegaraju said. “This is not only an issue for people who don’t speak English well but an issue based around gender equity.”

While it’s not uncommon for an interpreter to be on hand during a medical appointment to help a non-English-speaking patient communicate with a doctor, that help only goes so far.

“A patient may have an interpreter at the visit but once that visit ends the interpretation and understanding ends with them,” Elwalid said. “All their pharmacy interactions, their after-visit summaries, the medications they would take home, would all be in English, which would still be a big barrier for the continuity of care for our patients.”

According to the Institute of Medicine, over 90 million Americans misunderstand drug labels or have trouble following the directions. Medication errors are responsible for 1 of out 5 emergency room visits, with an average cost of $10,000. Pharmacoepidemiology & Drug Safety, a medical journal that examines the culture and methods of pharmacy practices, cites the total cost of the preventable visits at $1.2 million. For those with limited English proficiency, the rate of medication errors is twice as high.