The study, which took 2.5 years to complete, is the first of its type.

According to a report for the General Medical Council (Avery et al, 2012), patients over 65 were at a higher risk from prescribing errors, and with around 1 in 4 residents of British care homes diagnosed with diabetes (Sinclair and Aspray, 2009) the study sought to bring insights into the medication management aspect of NHS practice.

Working closely with the Luton and Dunstable University Hospital, the research team found a variety of incidents taking place in NHS medication systems supplying nursing homes including prescribing errors, dispensing errors, medication management and drug administration errors.

Frank Milligan, Chief Investigator and Senior Lecturer in Patient Safety at the University of Bedfordshire, said "the study aims to help understand different types of medication errors, which if addressed correctly can improve the safety of residents and also save the NHS time and money."

The findings of the study, focusing on nursing homes located in Bedfordshire and Hertfordshire, are currently being analysed. Once this process is completed, the results will be circulated as reports to all key NHS and nursing home stakeholders.

An article on the research was published in the Journal 'Nursing and residential care' in November 2014 and a second will feature in the British Journal of General Practice later this year." For more information please contact Frank Milligan at frank.milligan@beds.ac.uk