Clinical risk
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The sixteenth century physician Paracelsus is quoted as saying that ‘the only thing that differentiates a medicine from a poison is the dose’.
Clinical risk
The sixteenth
century physician Paracelsus is quoted as saying that ‘the only thing that
differentiates a medicine from a poison is the dose’. This view is just as
pertinent today as it was then, with medication-related incidents the third
highest incident type reported to the National Patient Safety Agency.
Furthermore, it has been estimated that 1000 deaths per year are due to
medication errors or adverse events. Although today’s medicines are subject to
rigorous safety checks as part of the licensing procedure they still represent
a significant clinical risk, since the use of medicines as a healthcare
interven-tion has grown significantly over the past decade. In 1998, there were,
on average, 10.5 prescription items dispensed in the community per head of
population per year, whereas in 2008 this had risen to 16.4 – growth of over
50%.
