Weve done many columns
on potentially inappropriate medications in the elderly. One class of drugs
that always appears on all such lists is benzodiazepines and benzodiazepine
receptor agonists. That includes those that are used for promoting sleep, including
benzodiazepines, zopiclone, and zolpidem.
Such are intended for short-term use but, unfortunately, many patients end up
taking them chronically. Weve described the safety issues associated with
these in multiple columns (listed below).
An excellent evidence-based guideline to help clinicians make decisions
about when and how to safely taper and stop benzodiazepine receptor agonists
was recently published in the journal Canadian Family Physician (Pottie 2018). They note the harms
associated benzodiazepine receptor agonists include physical dependence,
drowsiness, balance issues, falls, fractures, cognitive impairment, memory
disorders (including anterograde amnesia), functional impairment, and motor
vehicle accidents. They conducted a systematic review of benzodiazepine
receptor agonist (BZRA) deprescribing trials for insomnia, as well as
performing a review of the harms of continued BZRA use. The GRADE (Grading of
Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation) approach was used for
guideline development.
The guideline
recommends that deprescribing (tapering slowly) of BZRAs be offered to elderly
adults (≥ 65 years) who take BZRAs, regardless of duration of use, and
suggest that deprescribing (tapering slowly) be offered to adults aged 18 to 64
who have used BZRAs for more than 4 weeks. Note that the recommendations apply
to patients who use BZRAs to treat insomnia on its own (primary insomnia) or
comorbid insomnia where potential underlying comorbidities are effectively
managed. It does not apply to those with other sleep disorders or untreated
anxiety, depression, or other physical or mental health conditions that might
be causing or aggravating insomnia.
The Canadian
guideline article also notes the potential financial savings from deprescribing
BZRAs. That includes not just the cost of the drugs themselves but the savings
from fewer resultant falls and other adverse patient events.
The guideline comes
with an algorithm for deprescribing that includes recommendations about the
tapering and need to monitor the patient every 1-2 weeks for the duration of
the tapering process. The notes attached to the guideline have a list of the
commonly used offending drugs and excellent tips on how to promote sleep non-pharmacologically,
both in primary care and institutional settings. It also includes notes about
the role of cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT).
The Pottie article also acknowledges the importance of the
discussion that needs to take place with patients about deprescribing. Any
decision needs to be based on a balance of knowledge about a drugs
indication and effectiveness, as well as risks of use (actual or potential side
effects), drug interactions, pill burden, and cost. Decisions also need to take into account patient or family values and preferences
as part of shared decision making. The
authors note they have developed a patient pamphlet to help with these
discussions.
This is a
well-referenced and resourced article with excellent recommendations about
helping our patients discontinue drugs that may likely have outlasted their
temporary benefits but are still putting our patients at risk of many potential
adverse consequences.
For more on deprescribing, see our past columns listed below.
Also, ISMP Canada (ISMP
Canada 2018) recently published a Safety Bulletin that had links to
many excellent deprescribing resources that
you will find very valuable. One of the linked resources is a toolkit
for deprescribing benzodiazepines in older adults put out by Choosing
Wisely Canada. Choosing Wisely Canada has also developed several other toolkits
for deprescribing other drugs.
Some of our past columns on deprescribing:
Some of our previous columns on safety issues associated with sleep meds:
August 2009 Bold Experiment: Hospitals Saying No to Sleep Meds
March 23, 2010 ISMP Guidelines for Standard Order Sets
May 2012 Safety
of Hypnotic Drugs
November 2012 More
on Safety of Sleep Meds
March 2013 Sedative/Hypnotics
and Falls
June 2013 Zolpidem
and Emergency Room Visits
August 6, 2013 Let
Me Sleep!
June 3, 2014 More
on the Risk of Sedative/Hypnotics
May 15, 2018 Helping
Inpatients Sleep
Some of our past columns on Beers List and Inappropriate Prescribing in the Elderly:
References:
Pottie K, Thompson W, Davies S, et al.
Deprescribing benzodiazepine receptor agonists. Evidence-based clinical
practice guideline. Canadian Family Physician 2018; 64(5): 339-351
http://www.cfp.ca/content/64/5/339
ISMP Canada.
Deprescribing: Managing Medications to Reduce Polypharmacy. ISMP Canada Safety
Bulletin 2018; 18(3): 1-4 March 28, 2018
https://www.ismp-canada.org/download/safetyBulletins/2018/ISMPCSB2018-03-Deprescribing.pdf
Choosing Wisely
Canada. DROWSY WITHOUT FEELING LOUSY. A toolkit for reducing inappropriate use
of benzodiazepines and sedative-hypnotics among older adults in primary care.
July 2017
https://choosingwiselycanada.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/CWC-Toolkit-BenzoPrimaryCare-V3.pdf
Print June
2018 Deprescribing Benzodiazepine Receptor Agonists
Weve done multiple
columns questioning the likely overuse of oxygen and its potential untoward
side effects, particularly in patients with stroke or myocardial
infarction who are not hypoxemic (see
list of those prior columns below).
While many studies have shown lack of benefit of oxygen in patients who are not hypoxemic, only some have suggested that the oxygen supplementation may actually be harmful. Now, a new systematic review and meta-analysis (Chu 2018) concludes that, n acutely ill adults, high-quality evidence shows that liberal oxygen therapy increases mortality without improving other patient-important outcomes. The new review included not only studies of patients with stroke or myocardial infarction but also patients with sepsis, critical illness, trauma, or cardiac arrest, and patients who had emergency surgery. In all, the review included 25 randomized controlled trials with 16,037 total patients.
Compared with a conservative oxygen strategy, a liberal oxygen strategy (median baseline saturation of peripheral oxygen [SpO2] across trials, 96%) increased mortality in-hospital (relative risk 1.21), and at 30 days (RR 1.14), and at longest follow-up (RR 1.10). Morbidity outcomes (disability at longest follow-up, risk of hospital-acquired pneumonia, any hospital-acquired infection, and length of hospital stay) were similar between groups.
They conclude that supplemental oxygen might become unfavorable above an SpO2 range of 9496% and that these results support the conservative administration of oxygen therapy.
Some of our prior columns on potential harmful effects of oxygen:
April 8, 2008 Oxygen as a Medication
January 27, 2009 Oxygen Therapy: Everything You Wanted to Know and More!
April 2009 Nursing
Companion to the BTS Oxygen Therapy Guidelines
October 6, 2009 Oxygen
Safety: More Lessons from the UK
July 2010 Cochrane
Review: Oxygen in MI
December 6, 2011 Why
You Need to Beware of Oxygen Therapy
February 2012 More
Evidence of Harm from Oxygen
March 2014 Another
Strike Against Hyperoxia
June 17, 2014 SO2S
Confirms Routine O2 of No Benefit in Stroke
December 2014 Oxygen
Should Be AVOIDed
August 11, 2015 New
Oxygen Guidelines: Thoracic Society of Australia and NZ
November 2016 Oxygen
Tank Monitoring
November 2016 More
on Safer Use of Oxygen
October 2017 End
of the Oxygen in MI and Stroke Debate?
February 2018 Oxygen
Cylinders Back in the News
References:
Chu DK, Kim L H-Y, Young PJ, et al. Mortality and morbidity in acutely ill adults treated with liberal versus conservative oxygen therapy (IOTA): a systematic review and meta-analysis. Lancet 2018; 391(10131): 1693-1705, Published 28 April 2018
https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(18)30479-3/fulltext
Print June
2018 Too Much Oxygen
Among our numerous columns on surgical fires, several have focused on the role of skin preps or ointments as fuels for such fires:
Surgical fires caused by skin preps and ointments also recently was highlighted in an ISMP Medication Safety Alert (ISMP 2018). Over the years, ISMPs MERP (Medical Error Reporting Program) has noted fires related to a number of substances, mostly flammable substances such as surgical skin preps containing alcohol or alcohol-containing iodophors; eye lubricants and ointments containing petrolatum; wound dressings containing tincture of benzoin or collodion; and skin numbing agents containing ethyl chloride. The latest alert, however, notes some new potentially flammable substances.
Gebauers Ethyl Chloride spray, which had been applied as a numbing agent to a patients big toe prior to a minor surgical procedure, was ignited when electrocautery was used during the procedure. There are warnings on the bottle, both in the form of a small icon of a flame on the front of the bottle and warning text on the side buried within dense text that it should never be used in the presence of an open flame or electrical cautery equipment. Its certainly not surprising that such warnings were not heeded.
That is very reminiscent of the easily missed warning we
have described in numerous columns about the 26-ml Chloraprep
applicator as long ago as 2012 (see, for example, our January 10, 2017 Patient Safety Tip of the Week The
26-ml Applicator Strikes Again!). Indeed, the new ISMP report also includes yet another instance
related to the 26-ml applicator.
The ISMP article goes on to mention past cases related to Gebauers Ethyl Chloride spray, LACRI-LUBE S.O.P. ocular lubricant (white petrolatum and mineral oil ophthalmic ointment), and tincture of benzoin.
As usual, the ISMP alert has excellent recommendations for reducing the risks of surgical fires related to such substances. First is taking inventory of such substances in multiple areas (not just ORs but any procedural locations, including doctors offices, clinics, and ambulatory surgery units). Then the list should be evaluated to see whether safer alternatives are available.
Ensuring awareness of the risks should be a priority. This includes affixing ancillary labeling to the products where the manufacturers warnings are not prominent or distinctive, as in the case of the 26-ml Chloraprep applicator or the Gebauers Ethyl Chloride spray. The also emphasize selection of properly sized prefilled applicators of alcohol-based surgical skin prep solutions.
They also reiterate the other important aspects for prevention of surgical fires, including:
Weve pointed out in our previous columns that there has been a shift over the years in the setting of surgical fires. They now occur more frequently in relatively minor surgeries like temporal artery biopsies, or removal of skin lesions or cosmetic procedures on the head/neck region. Two key factors contribute to that trend. One is that in such cases oxygen may be given in a free fashion (i.e. it may be delivered via nasal prongs or a face mask rather than via an endotracheal tube or otherwise secured airway). The other factor is a general cavalier attitude when doing minor cases and lack of attention to things like the risk of flammable substances as described in todays column.
Surgical fires are never events that are fully preventable. But organizations need to ensure they have raised awareness, done appropriate training, discuss the fire risk during the pre-procedure huddle and/or surgical timeout, and do the things noted above.
Our prior columns on surgical fires:
References:
ISMP (Institute for Safe Medication Practices). Surgical fires caused by skin preps and ointments: Rare but dangerous and preventable. ISMP Medication Safety Alert! Acute Care Edition 2018; March 8, 2018
Print June
2018 ISMP on Fire Risk from Skin Preps
Weve done several columns highlighting the dangers of inaccurate patient weights in the electronic medical record (EMR). The biggest danger is that incorrect weights may lead to over- or under-dosing for medications whose dose is calculated based upon patient weights. And since many such calculations are based upon the weight entered into a single field in the EMR, a single error may be propagated many times.
We came across an interesting study that looked at incorrect weights in the EMR (Chen 2018). While the focus of the study was identifying errors that skewed data trends over time, the findings of the study have potential patient safety implications and potential solutions.
The authors wrote a program using Perl (Strawberry Perl, 5.24.1.1) to calculate the percentage of weight change for all the possible time intervals between measures (not just consecutive ones) for each patient.
After applying the algorithms and conducting a manual review, they found 2638 spurious values from 317,115 weight data points. This suggests that, at minimum, ∼0.8% of all the weight values in this EMR were spurious. By examining each patient record, they found that 1976 of the 10,000 patients (19.8%) had ≥1 spurious value recorded in the observation period.
Types of error:
Single digit error 148 for 178 42.4%
Decimal misplacement 15.63 for 156.3 0.8%
Missing digit error 11 for 191 5.4%
Transposition 137 for 173 4.2%
kg value entered in lbs. 70 for 154 7.1%
lb value multiplied by 2.2 338.8 for 154 5.6%
No clear reason 237 for 185 34.5%
Weights found to be spurious by all 3 of their algorithms and by manual review comprised ∼1% of all the weight recordings. At least one spurious weight occurred in 1 in 5 patient charts over a 10-y period.
When analyzing such weights in the EMR over time, straightforward algorithms can identify and remove them. Such algorithms, however, might not be useful in acutely hospitalized patients unless a whole host of prior weights were available for analysis. Nevertheless, the types of error identified by Chen et al. are informative because they demonstrate the potential for similar erroneous weights to be recorded in the EMR at a time when they could lead to potentially serious over- or under-dosing of medications.
Some of our other columns on errors related to patient weights:
March 23, 2010 ISMP Guidelines for Standard Order Sets
September 2010 NPSA Alert on LMWH Dosing
August 2, 2011 Hazards of ePrescribing
January 2013 More IT Unintended Conseequences
December 8, 2015 Danger of Inaccurate Weights in Stroke Care
May 2016 ECRI Institutes Top 10 Patient Safety Concerns for 2016
September 2017 Weight-Based
Dosing in Children
January 2018 Can
We Improve Barcoding?
References:
Chen S, Banks WA, Sheffrin M, et al. Identifying and categorizing spurious weight data in electronic medical records. The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition 2018; 107(3): 420-426
https://academic.oup.com/ajcn/article/107/3/420/4939337?rss=1
Print June
2018 Incorrect Weights in the EMR
Print June
2018 What's New in the Patient Safety World (full column)
Print June
2018 Deprescribing Benzodiazepine Receptor Agonists
Print June
2018 Too Much Oxygen
Print June
2018 ISMP on Fire Risk from Skin Preps
Print June
2018 Incorrect Weights in the EMR
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