Question

question 105

a pharmacy technician is reviewing a prescription that does not specify the route of administration. the technician should recognize that this falls into which of the following categories of medication errors?

dispensing error
prescribing error
administration error
monitoring error

Explanation:

Analyze the prescription omission

The scenario describes a prescription written by a prescriber that does not specify the route of administration. Because the route is a required element of a complete and valid prescription, omitting this information at the time of writing constitutes an error in the prescribing phase.

Classify the medication error

We evaluate the four standard categories of medication errors:

• Prescribing error: Incorrect drug selection, dose, route, concentration, rate of administration, or instructions for use, as well as illegible prescriptions or omissions of critical information (such as the route of administration) written by the prescriber.
• Dispensing error: An error made by the pharmacy staff during the preparation, packaging, or labeling of the medication (e.g., dispensing the wrong drug or incorrect strength).
• Administration error: An error made by the person administering the drug to the patient (e.g., giving the drug to the wrong patient, at the wrong time, or via the wrong route).
• Monitoring error: Failure to review a prescribed regimen for appropriateness or failure to monitor clinical/laboratory data to assess the patient's response to prescribed therapy.

Since the omission of the route of administration occurred when the prescription was written by the provider, it is classified as a prescribing error.

Answer:

• Dispensing error
• Prescribing error (Correct answer)
• Administration error
• Monitoring error