Expansion of patient safety regulatory requirements in community pharmacy in Canada: The Melissa Sheldrick effect?

Over the past 2 decades, the patient safety movement has had a large impact on health care in Canada and beyond. Twenty years ago, the Institute of Medicine’s report, To Err Is Human: Building a Safer Health System, drew worldwide attention to the problem of errors in health care.1 Here in Canada, the 2004 Canadian Adverse Event Study described the magnitude of errors in Canadian hospitals for the first time.2 Other research estimated the annual cost of preventable drug-related morbidity and mortality in older adults in Canada to be $11 billion.3 By the early 2000s, the Canadian Patient Safety Institute and the Institute for Safe Medication Practices (ISMP) Canada were established, and there was widespread participation in national patient safety campaigns such as Safer Healthcare Now