Data_Sheet_3_Finding Consensus About the Level of Medication Safety in a Hospital Setting: Development and an Example of Application of a Modified Delphi Method.docx

A version of the Institute for Safe Medication Practices (ISMP) questionnaire adapted to the Austrian inpatient setting was used to sample the estimates of a group of experts regarding the level of medication safety in a level II hospital. To synthesize expert opinions on a group level reproducibly, classical Delphi method elements were combined with an item weight and performance weight decision-maker. This newly developed information synthesis method was applied to the sample dataset to examine method applicability. Method descriptions and flow diagrams were generated. Applicability was then tested by creating a synthesis of individual questionnaires. An estimate of the level of medication safety in an Austrian level II hospital was, thus, generated. Over the past two decades, initiatives regarding patient safety, in general, and medication safety, in particular, have been gaining momentum. Questionnaires are state of the art for assessing medication practice in healthcare facilities. Acquiring consistent data about medication in the complex setting of a hospital, however, has not been standardized. There are no publicly available benchmark datasets and, in particular, there is no published method to reliably synthesize expertise regarding medication safety on an expert group level. The group-level information synthesis method developed in this study has the potential to synthesize information about the level of medication safety in a hospital setting more reliably than unstructured approaches. A medication safety level estimate for a representative Austrian level II hospital was generated. Further studies are needed to establish convergence characteristics and benchmarks for medication safety on a larger scale.

本研究采用针对奥地利住院环境改编的药物安全实践研究所（ISMP）问卷，对一组专家关于二级医院药物安全水平的评估进行了抽样。为在群体层面上可重复地综合专家意见，将经典德尔菲法要素与项目权重及绩效权重决策者相结合。新开发的信息综合方法被应用于样本数据集，以检验方法适用性。同时生成了方法描述和流程图。随后，通过创建单个问卷的综合来测试其适用性。从而生成了一份关于奥地利二级医院药物安全水平的估计。在过去二十年中，关于患者安全，尤其是药物安全的倡议一直在不断加强。问卷已成为评估医疗机构药物实践的最新技术手段。然而，在复杂医院环境中获取关于药物的一致数据尚未实现标准化。目前尚无公开可用的基准数据集，尤其是缺乏在专家群体层面上可靠综合药物安全知识的已发表方法。本研究开发的群体层面信息综合方法，有望比非结构化方法更可靠地综合医院环境中的药物安全水平信息。已生成了一份具有代表性的奥地利二级医院药物安全水平估计。为进一步研究，需要建立更大规模药物安全水平的收敛特性和基准。