In one hospital, orders for medications for patients were written by doctors. Information was transferred to the pharmacy computer, and then to a medication administration form for use by the nurses. Medications were sometimes not administered to patients who needed them, either because the orders were entered wrong on one of the two entries, or because the nurses forgot to give the medicines that were listed correctly. The opportunities for errors were reduced by having doctors enter orders for medications in the computer using a terminal on the patient units. This information was then available to pharmacists and nurses. Also, the medication administration form was redesigned. It previously contained information on medications, such as "take three times a day for four days." The redesigned form displayed a timeline that had the specific medications that were to be given at each hour of the day. This served as a reminder to the nurses. Most of the omission errors were eliminated by these two changes.