Trigger Tool-Based Detection of Adverse Drug Reactions – A Prospective Observational Study

Abstract

Background: To prevent medication-related patient harm and improve healthcare safety and quality, the hospital needs to detect, report, and review adverse drug reactions (ADR) so that specific target safety interventions can be done. Triggers are clues or tools used to identify adverse events. Methodology: A prospective review of patient (n = 366) records using the Global Trigger Tool method was undertaken to detect ADRs for 6 months. The presence of ADRs was reviewed by three independent authors using 39 triggers, and the findings were validated by a physician and a clinical pharmacist. Data collected was entered in Excel and analyzed by using SPSS Version 29.0 Results: Among 366 patient records reviewed, 203 times triggers were observed; the most common trigger was antiemetics (32.02%). However, the most common trigger related to adverse effects was using the other medication module trigger (25.12%). A total of 47 ADRs were observed, of which 44 were associated with triggers, and three were reported spontaneously. The most common ADR was found to be constipation in 11 patients (23.40%), and the most common drug class associated with ADRs was observed to be antibiotics in 16 patients (34.04%). There was no association observed between the ADR and the patient-specific factors. Conclusion: The trigger tool can be a feasible method for identifying ADRs compared to the traditional ADR identification methods. To improve the quality of patient safety,trigger-tool-based identification of ADR can be used in routine settings.