SOS Rx

Clearinghouse of Safe Practices in High-Risk Situations

Update

May 18, 2005

This project will develop a clearinghouse of safe medication practices for high-risk situations in the outpatient setting.

Rationale

The clearinghouse will fill gaps in exiting databases on safe medication practices, and will focus on high-risk drugs in the outpatient setting. Physicians need access to evidence-based safe practices and information on how to communicate those practices to patients, and patients need to know what actions to take and questions to ask about their medications.

Objectives

The clearinghouse will:

1) Collect evidence and literature about the safe practices on high-risk drugs in the outpatient setting. Include public and private sector research reports, plus generalized information from other settings.

2) Assemble, catalogue and maintain online database.

3) Make all accessible to clinicians and consumers. Primarily a resource for physicians when prescribing and other health care professionals, but will also contain consumer-friendly version of the safe practices

4) Translate research on safe practices on outpatient medications into safer, better clinical practice.

Status

SOS Rx is now seeking a partner to develop and/or house clearinghouse. Partner or host must have credibility, management skills, and content expertise.

We want to explore with AHRQ the possibility of supporting the establishment of the SOS Rx clearinghouse project under the umbrella of the updated AHRQ “Making Health Care Safer: A Critical Analysis of Patient Safety Practices.” As we now consider the best way to move forward with the SOS Rx Clearinghouse project, we believe a logical next step would be to work with AHRQ to update the Safe Practices report with an associated clearinghouse component. Developing an updated Safe Practices report into a web-based clearinghouse format would make the information more accessible to health care professionals and consumers alike. This online version of the report could be more easily updated on a continual basis

We have also recently had discussions with the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations (JCAHO) regarding their new website, a project of their International Center for Patient Safety. There may be possibilities for collaboration with them on the clearinghouse. We continue to discuss the clearinghouse with CMS.