Need and Requirements Elicitation for Electronic Access to Patient´s Medication History in the Emergency Department

Electronic access to patient´s medication history (PMH) in the emergency department (ED) in Portugal is not widely granted, nor has the importance of such access been clearly assessed. Given the known association between poor PMH and medication errors, the goal of this study was to gather requirements for such a system, assessing physicians´ opinions regarding the importance of having access to PMH in the ED. A questionnaire was sent to all Portuguese public hospitals which approved the study, and forwarded by email by the internal services of each hospital to ED physicians. Fourteen hospitals authorized the study, from which 83 ED physicians answered the questionnaire. PMH-related information considered most important focused on medication name and posology (>90%) and date and dose of prescription (>80%), but also date of dispensing of medications (>40%). Other information such as allergies (99%) and adverse reactions (96%) were similarly considered important, and physicians agree with the inclusion of non-prescription medications (85%) as well as homeopathic medicines (64%). Overall, access to PMH in the ED appears to be important and present benefits to patients´ care. Given this, electronic access to PHM should be settled in Portuguese ED.