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Types of Medication Errors The Council realized the need for a standardized categorization of errors. On July 16, 1996, the NCC MERP adopted a Medication Error Index that classifies an error according to the severity of the outcome. It is hoped that the index will help health care practitioners and institutions to track medication errors in a consistent, systematic manner. The index considers factors such as whether the error reached the patient and, if the patient was harmed, to what degree. The Council encourages the use of the index in all health care delivery settings and by researchers and vendors of medication error tracking software. The USP Medication Errors Reporting Program has implemented this index for use in the USP database. Medication Error Index NCC MERP Index for Categorizing Medication Errors Color / Black & White   (Requires Acrobat Reader 4.0) NCC MERP Index for Categorizing Medication Errors Algorithm Color / Black & White   (Requires Acrobat Reader 4.0) Adopted July 16, 1996, revised Feb 20, 2001 Reference: Hartwig, S.C., Denger, S.D., & Schneider, P.J. (1991) Severity-indexed, incident report-based medication error-reporting program. Am J Hosp Pharm, 48. 2611-2616 © 1998–2008 National Coordinating Council for Medication Error Reporting and Prevention. All Rights Reserved. *Permission is hereby granted to reproduce information contained herein provided that such reproduction shall not modify the text and shall include the copyright notice appearing on the pages from which it was copied.