West London Children’s Healthcare uses tool for safe prescribing

West London Children’s Healthcare (WLCH) has deployed a clinical decision support system to help safeguard prescribing for children and young people.

The paediatric network, which brings together acute and specialist services for almost 500,000 children, went live with Dosium’s Touchdose software in the children’s emergency department at St Mary’s Hospital in August 2024. 

Dosium, a spin-out from Imperial College London’s Institute of Global Health Innovation, integrates with the British National Formulary (BNF) and British National Formulary for Children (BNFC), using this data to automatically determine the correct prescription dose for any patient.

Its tool, Touchdose is designed to reduce prescribing errors by using electronic patient record data to make prescribing recommendations in accordance with BNF and BNFC guidelines, based on factors such as a patient’s weight, age, sex and condition.

There are around 237 million medication errors in England each year, resulting in more than 18,000 avoidable NHS bed days, according to national estimates, published in the BMJ.

Calculating drug doses for children is more complex than for adults due to differences in body composition and metabolism, meaning that even small errors can have considerable impact.

Touchdose helps clinicians to determine the correct dosage for young patients and provides recommendations on medication administration route, frequency and the duration of treatment. 

Ian Maconochie, chief clinical information officer at West London Children’s Healthcare, said: “We’re thrilled to go live with Dosium, a crucial step in our mission to reduce prescription errors and prevent avoidable harm.

“This partnership is a significant stride forward for healthcare in northwest London, ensuring that our young patients receive the safest care possible”.

Touchdose will be rolled out to an additional five departments across Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust and Chelsea and Westminster Hospital NHS Foundation Trust in Autumn 2024.

St Mary’s general paediatrics department will be next to deploy the tool, followed by Chelsea and Westminster’s paediatric emergency department and general paediatrics departments.

It will then go live at West Middlesex University Hospital’s emergency department and general medicine departments. 

Nicholas Appelbaum, cofounder of Dosium, said: “Busy staff across the country are working out prescription dosages on paper because they lack safe and effective tools to do it automatically. In 2024, this simply shouldn’t be the case.

“We’re thrilled to get to work changing this in a London partnership that will reduce prescription errors – and crucially, reduce the avoidable harm that can result”.

The project was funded through NHS England’s digital medicines first-of-type scheme, which is designed to leverage digital technology to provide safer, more efficient, and more patient-centred prescribing practice.

Results of a simulated, randomised study, published in July 2024, found that Touchdose reduced prescribing errors by 76.5% compared with standard practices.

The tool also reduced the time it took to prescribe by 20%, while 96% of the 24 study participants felt the tool reduced their workload.

Meanwhile, in January 2024 Sheffield Children’s NHS Foundation Trust went live with an integrated electronic prescribing and medicines administration solution from System C which is optimised for children and young people.