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Anticoagulant therapy is widely used for prevention and treatment of cardiovascular disease and is frequently prescribed both in primary and secondary care. In comparison to other drugs, the frequency of medication errors is high for anticoagulant therapy. In Denmark, 4,383 adverse events with vitamin K antagonists and 3,234 adverse events with non-vitamin K antagonist oral anticoagulants were reported to the Danish Patient Safety Authority in 2014-2017. In this review, we provide an overview of medication errors and discuss frequent adverse events and pitfalls.

Modern patient care requires collaboration among health-care workers belonging to various functional units, departments and hospitals. When the responsibility for patients is handed over, information is easily lost. This literature review identifies problems in patient handover situations and proposes solutions to these. We reviewed 417 papers and the analysis comprises 29 papers. The paper points out numerous problems in connection with the transfer of responsibility, showing the importance of focusing on patient handover as a vulnerable phase in patient care.