Study finds 1-in-5 chance of error in kids' cancer drugs

Kids with leukemia treated as outpatients at Seattle Children's Hospital & Regional Medical Center have about a 1-in-5 chance of being given the wrong medication or the wrong dosage, a study being published today says.

Most mistakes the researchers found were trivial, although three could — but did not — cause problems for the children, said the lead researcher, Dr. James A. Taylor, professor of pediatrics at the University of Washington Medical Center.

Taylor said he was amazed at how well the doctors who prescribed treatment and the parents who administered the drugs did in the study.

Taylor's study is in today's issue of Cancer, a journal by the American Cancer Society.

The hospital's self-study, conducted over two months in 2005, involved children diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia, the most common malignancy diagnosed in children. About a third of all kids with cancer have this disease.

The study looked at each possible point for medication error: from the doctor's prescription to the pharmacy to dosing by parents or caregivers. Taylor and his team found errors at every point along the way, except for the pharmacy, which made no mistakes.

The study looked at 69 patients receiving 172 medications and found 17 errors — 12 in administration and five in prescription. At least one medication error affected 13 children studied, or 18.8 percent.

One medication error had the potential for disastrous results, the report said. All the prescribing errors were miscalculated doses. The worst was a 57 percent overdose of a weekly medication.

Many errors were caused by parents mistaking the amount of a drug they were supposed to administer or giving drugs more often or more seldom than prescribed.