The Medical Association will review drug dispensing guidelines sent to 6,500 general practitioners last year after a similar blunder killed four patients.
But pharmacists said the latest incident proved that guidelines were not effective enough. A separation of prescribing and dispensing was the only way out in the long term, they said.
A month after 153 people with stomach ailments were found to have been given the diabetes drug gliclazide by Wong Tai Sin doctor Ronald Li Sai-lai in May last year, the association formed a taskforce on drug dispensing.
The taskforce released the Good Dispensing Practice Manual in July last year, urging doctors to follow a system of 'three checks and seven rights' at all times to prevent prescription blunders.
'It's time to review the guidelines,' taskforce co-chairman Cheng Chi-man said. 'It's been a year already [since the diabetes drug blunder]. Some doctors may have relaxed their vigilance.'
He said questionnaires might be sent out later this year to all taskforce members to collect their opinions and practice patterns.