Exploring the Use of Persuasive System Design Principles to Enhance Medication Incident Reporting and Learning Systems: Scoping Reviews and Persuasive Design Assessment

Abstract

Background

Medication incidents (MIs) causing harm to patients have far-reaching consequences for patients, pharmacists, public health, business practice, and governance policy. Medication Incident Reporting and Learning Systems (MIRLS) have been implemented to mitigate such incidents and promote continuous quality improvement in community pharmacies in Canada. They aim to collect and analyze MIs for the implementation of incident preventive strategies to increase safety in community pharmacy practice. However, this goal remains inhibited owing to the persistent barriers that pharmacies face when using these systems.

Objective

This study aims to investigate the harms caused by medication incidents and technological barriers to reporting and identify opportunities to incorporate persuasive design strategies in MIRLS to motivate reporting.

Methods

We conducted 2 scoping reviews to provide insights on the relationship between medication errors and patient harm and the information system–based barriers militating against reporting. Seven databases were searched in each scoping review, including PubMed, Public Health Database, ProQuest, Scopus, ACM Library, Global Health, and Google Scholar. Next, we analyzed one of the most widely used MIRLS in Canada using the Persuasive System Design (PSD) taxonomy—a framework for analyzing, designing, and evaluating persuasive systems. This framework applies behavioral theories from social psychology in the design of technology-based systems to motivate behavior change. Independent assessors familiar with MIRLS reported the degree of persuasion built into the system using the 4 categories of PSD strategies: primary task, dialogue, social, and credibility support.

Results

Overall, 17 articles were included in the first scoping review, and 1 article was included in the second scoping review. In the first review, significant or serious harm was the most frequent harm (11/17, 65%), followed by death or fatal harm (7/17, 41%). In the second review, the authors found that iterative design could improve the usability of an MIRLS; however, data security and validation of reports remained an issue to be addressed. Regarding the MIRLS that we assessed, participants considered most of the primary task, dialogue, and credibility support strategies in the PSD taxonomy as important and useful; however, they were not comfortable with some of the social strategies such as cooperation. We found that the assessed system supported a number of persuasive strategies from the PSD taxonomy; however, we identified additional strategies such as tunneling, simulation, suggestion, praise, reward, reminder, authority, and verifiability that could further enhance the perceived persuasiveness and value of the system.

Conclusions

MIRLS, equipped with persuasive features, can become powerful motivational tools to promote safer medication practices in community pharmacies. They have the potential to highlight the value of MI reporting and increase the readiness of pharmacists to report incidents. The proposed persuasive design guidelines can help system developers and community pharmacy managers realize more effective MIRLS.