‘Team Alice’
This week, the University at Buffalo launched ‘Team Alice’ to combat medical errors and polypharmacy in the elderly. A multidisciplinary and cross faculty initiative to identify and tackle the barriers in our current system to increase patient safety.
As part of the launch, patient safety advocate Mary Brennan-Taylor told the shocking story about her mom, Alice. Her story can be read a blog post on We The Patients. Impressive to see the work of Mary Brennan-Taylor since her mother’s passing.
Tokyo Study
Physicians Weekly reports on a study in Tokyo on researching polypharmacy on 1 million older adults and allowed for the discovery of some countermeasures.
Adverse drug events recap
“With more than 10,000 prescription drugs on the market and about one-third of all American adults taking five or more medications daily, there is plenty of room for potential adverse drug events. Each year, adverse drug events lead to an estimated 700,000 emergency department visits and 100,000 hospitalizations, according to the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality. Unnervingly, most are considered preventable.”