Steve Anthony: True Canadian Pharmacy

Whether it’s justified or not, doctors are notorious for having illegible handwriting. But if a New Brunswick start-up can prove its service is worthwhile, patients may no longer wonder how pharmacists can read prescriptions.
Saint John-based MedRunner is working on a prototype for a virtual prescription service that would not only make picking up medicine quicker, easier and more efficient but also integrate with, and contribute to, a patient’s !–more– medical record.
In paper prescriptions there’s so much room for error, and adverse reactions, says MedRunner co-founder Todd Murphy, an MBA student at the University of New Brunswick
If a prescription were misread it could result in death, he says, but in a virtual system that mistake is far less likely.
The company has the Department of Health’s approval to work in co-operation with the pharmaceutical association to test the service to prove the concept works.
The service, which is still under development, would be part of New Brunswick’s province-wide e-health records system, which would allow doctors to easily access a patient’s medical and list of past and current prescriptions when deciding on a treatment.

br /br /canadapharmacynews.com

Barely legible handwritten prescriptions could become a pharmacists’ headache of the past in Ontario as the provincial government on Tuesday introduced its first phase of a paperless prescription process.
The system, called ePrescribing, lets doctors forgo handwritten prescriptions, instead sending instructions to pharmacists electronically through a private computer network.
Doctors say patient safety will be enhanced because the prescriptions (more…)