Institute for Safe Medication Practices

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Institute for Safe Medication Practices

ISMP is the nation’s only 501c (3) nonprofit organization devoted entirely to medication error prevention and safe medication use.

10/02/2026

🛡️ Spotting the warning signs can help prevent patient harm. At the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health BESAFE 2026 conference, ISMP President Rita Jew joined Henry Michtalik, Douglas Braun, and Clarence Lam on the panel "Blind Spots in Practice: Uncovering What Providers Miss About Substandard and Falsified Medicines." Together, they explored how healthcare providers can better recognize and respond to suspect medical products.

Key takeaways from Rita's presentation include:
🔹 Watch for red flags such as unusual packaging and labeling, ability to purchase online without prescription, and no licensed pharmacist available to answer questions.
🔹 Ask patients where they obtain their medications and discuss risks associated with illegal online pharmacies.
🔹 Consider substandard or falsified medicines as possible culprit when medications aren't working as expected or patients experience unexpected outcomes.
🔹 Develop mitigation strategies for known problem drugs such as GLP1 agonists.
🔹 Report concerns and suspicious products to help strengthen surveillance efforts and protect patients from harm.

Learn more about the fight against substandard and falsified medical products: https://hubs.la/Q04z1CDR0

Additional ISMP tips: https://hubs.la/Q04z1CGB0

09/28/2026

Specialty pharmacy prescriptions now account for roughly 50% of total pharmaceutical spending in developed markets — and with that volume comes complex risk.

ISMP's Specialty Pharmacy Membership gives your team the data-driven guidance needed to reduce complex drug-related safety events and protect the high-risk patients you serve every day.

👉 Learn more about the membership: https://hubs.la/Q04ygztZ0

09/25/2026

📊 Can medication error reports tell us whether patient safety is improving? Not on their own, ISMP President Dr. Rita Jew says in a Becker’s Hospital Review article.

Medication errors remain significantly underreported, and incidents that cause visible harm are reported more consistently than near misses with the same potential for harm.

Dr. Jew stresses that the number of error reports alone does not indicate whether an organization is safer. ISMP instead advocates learning from errors, close calls, and system vulnerabilities to help organizations identify risks and prevent patient harm.

🔗 Read Dr. Jew’s insights: https://hubs.la/Q04ygqhN0

09/23/2026

Join the MSB Clinician Database.
Med Safety Board (MSB), an ISMP company powered by ECRI, is growing its network of healthcare professionals dedicated to advancing medication and medical device safety.

As a member of the MSB Clinician Database, you may be invited to lend your expertise to:
- Paid surveys on real-world safety challenges
- Trademark name evaluations to help identify look-alike/sound-alike (LASA) risks
- One-time consultations on specific safety questions
- Advisory boards addressing emerging issues in the field

Participation is always optional and project-specific — designed to fit your schedule and respect your time as a busy healthcare professional.

We're enrolling pharmacists, nurses, physicians, medication safety practitioners, and other healthcare professionals across all practice settings, both in the US and internationally.

Joining the database doesn't guarantee selection for every project, but it does ensure you're considered for future MSB engagements that align with your background and interests.

Ready to contribute your expertise to safer patient care?
Join the MSB Clinician Database today: https://hubs.la/Q04y6MkV0

09/22/2026

🚨 Prescription medications marketed as emergency kits for at-home use can create serious safety risks.

In MedPage Today, ECRI and ISMP raise concerns about kits that allow individuals to select among multiple prescription medications. Choosing the wrong medication, dose, or treatment duration could delay appropriate treatment and worsen a patient’s condition.

As ISMP President Dr. Rita Jew explains, these kits may also be used long after they are dispensed. Without a medical evaluation immediately before use, changes in a person’s health conditions, medications, or allergies could increase the risk of harmful drug interactions or other adverse reactions.

🔗 Read the article: https://hubs.la/Q04y33Ry0

09/21/2026

🌊 It's time to explore new depths in medication safety.

Join us for the 29th Annual Cheers Awards at SeaWorld Orlando as we celebrate the individuals and organizations making waves in patient safety.

Together, we'll recognize innovation, inspire collaboration, and support ISMP's mission to create safer healthcare for all.

🎟️ Reserve your seat today: https://hubs.la/Q04xVNTR0

09/15/2026

🤝ISMP is helping advance patient safety culture on a larger scale! Jana O'Hara, Director of Consulting & Education, has been selected to join AHRQ's Surveys on Patient Safety Culture (SOPS) Technical Expert Panel, bringing a medication safety perspective to this national initiative.

SOPS surveys are widely used by healthcare organizations to assess safety culture, uncover opportunities for improvement, and help build safer systems for patients and staff alike.

Jana will contribute medication safety expertise and ISMP’s unique insights drawn from our error-reporting programs to panel discussions on development of future surveys and resources for strengthening safety culture across the care continuum.

🎓 Want to learn more about advancing fair accountability and system improvements, especially in the field of patient safety? Apply for a Just Culture Champion Scholarship (deadline is September 28): https://hubs.la/Q04xmjgw0

09/11/2026

Last chance to register for ISMP's Community and Specialty Pharmacy Medication Safety Intensive Workshop on October 2 and 9.

Strengthen your ability to identify safety risks, implement practical safeguards, and improve medication-use processes.

👉 Register now: https://hubs.la/Q03_0nxC0

09/10/2026

⚠️ Recent recalls highlight the importance of inspecting injectable products before use.

Two national voluntary drug recalls have been issued in the past month for potential presence of particulate matter--two lots of sodium chloride injection from Baxter and three lots of epinephrine injection from American Regent. Foreign particles in injectable medicines and IV fluids are a known problem, and several brands have been subjected to recalls related to contamination issues over the years.

ISMP receives reports of quality issues with sterile medications through its voluntary medication error reporting program. Particles that are small enough to escape notice may pose risks to patients, which is why surveillance and prompt reporting are key components of safe medication use.

Pharmacists should:
- Check inventory against the affected lot numbers
- Quarantine and remove any recalled product from active use
- Alert nursing and clinical staff to prevent administration of affected lots
- Report quality problems with sterile medications to ISMP: https://hubs.la/Q04x8fQG0

Patients and families should feel free to ask their nurse or pharmacist questions, including whether the product they are receiving is affected by a recall.

🔗 FDA 0.9% sodium chloride recall notice: https://hubs.la/Q04x8fJZ0
🔗 FDA 30 mg/ 30 mL epinephrine recall notice: https://hubs.la/Q04x8fKC0

09/02/2026

🎉 ISMP welcomes a national medication safety nurse leader!

Stacie Ethington, MSN, RN, has joined ISMP, bringing 17 years of clinical experience, including nearly a decade as a Medication Safety Nurse Specialist at Nebraska Medicine where she drove medication safety strategy and facilitated root cause analyses and peer review.

Stacie has spearheaded implementation of IV pump interoperability, ENFit conversion, and use of a thermal printer for IV line labeling, and co-authored a 10-year review of enteral misconnection adverse events that has been published in Nutrition in Clinical Practice. She is a recipient of the Carol M. Wilson Nursing Award in Quality.

“From early on, I saw errors handled in a non-judgmental way and staff encouraged to learn from mistakes—so that has always been a top priority in my clinical practice,” Stacie says. “I came to ISMP for the unparalleled opportunity to work on larger scale prevention efforts and hope to integrate nursing even more into all things medication safety.”

📰 Nurses looking to stay current on medication safety issues can also check out Nurse AdviseERR, our newsletter written specifically for the nursing community: https://hubs.la/Q04w68GN0

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Philadelphia, PA

Telephone

+12159477797

Website

http://www.ismp.org/

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