Medication Errors

Medication errors are preventable and cause great harm to the patients and their families. Every year in Australian hospitals, medication errors occur as nurses do not follow the 9 rights of medication administration. The 9 rights are right patient, drug, route, time, documentation, response, action and form (Fossum et al., 2016). Medication errors can be caused by

There are a variety of different outcomes that pertain to a medication error. As I have stated previously, multiple people are affected when a medication error takes place. Not only does this affect the patient and nurse, but also the physician, and healthcare that you are working for. As an employee, you represent the healthcare facility that you work for. The patient’s family will also be affected. Say for instance you gave a patient an extremely high dose of a medication that lead to an overdose, the patients family will be affected dramatically. There are still a high number of medication errors for this to be problematic. This incident happens too frequently, which is why researchers are trying to find a cause and solution. It has also been noted that there are a high number of medication errors than what is actually reported. The Nursing Economic$ journal found that 19% of doses given in the 36 facilities they were researching, 7% were considered as harmful (Tseng, 2012). Even though the error affects multiple people, the nurses are the main care-giver when it comes to giving medication. Nurses are the people responsible for giving the medication. They are responsible for double-checking and making sure they are giving the correct dosage and knowing the information about the medication they are giving. While there are a high number of medication

Medication errors are the leading cause of morbidity and preventable death in hospitals (Adams). In fact, approximately 1.5 million Americans are injured each year as a result of medication errors in hospitals (Foote). Not only are medication errors harmful to patients but medication errors are very expensive for hospitals. Medication errors cost America’s health care system 3.5 billion dollars per year (Foote).Errors in medication administration occurs when one of the five rights of medication administration is omitted. The five rights are: a) the right dose, b) the right medication, c) the right patient, d) the right route of administration, and e) the right time of delivery (Adams). Medication administration is an essential part of

Errors made while administering medications is one of the most common health care errors reported. It is estimated that 7,000 hospitals deaths yearly are attributed to medication administration errors.

There are many factors that contribute to medication errors resulting in consequences to both patient and nurse. Factors that can contribute to errors include illegible handwritten drug orders, confusing drug names, and the use of nonstandard or unclear abbreviations (Neal, 2006). For the patient, the effect of drug errors can range from no side effects to death. For the nurse who commits a medication error the consequences can range from additional training and supervision to lawsuits and revocation of licensure. Medication errors can occur at any stage in the process of delivering medications to patients, from the originating prescriber to the pharmacy, but the majority of medication errors occur during administration.

As a result medication errors are costly and seem to be relative to the staffing of nurses. Given that nurses make up such a large segment of the staff population, it is important to identify with the factors behind these medication errors.

Medication errors are one of the leading causes within a patient care setting thatcan jeopardize the client’s safety, and can even potentially be fatal. The six patient rights,right dose, time, route, medication, patient and documentation, all help prevent errors andpromote patient safety. The nurse needs to check off each patient right in order tosuccessfully pass medications. One of the leading causes for missing one of these patientrights is interruptions in the process of medication administration prep, or when activelygiving the medication to the patient. This paper will discuss why interruptions duringmedication administration can cause errors, and interventions the nurse can do to avoidputting the patient in

It is evident that patient safety is one of the most important principal in place as a nurse. To insure this there are many standards that are set in place that as a registered nurse need to be met, some including, professional responsibility and accountability, having knowledge based practice, ethical practice, service to the public and self-regulation (SRNA, 2014). “These standards and foundation competencies serve as the criteria against which all registered nurses, practising in all domains of nursing practice (direct care, education, administration, and research, and the evolving domain of policy) will be measured by clients, employers, colleagues and themselves”(SRNA, 2014). Having these standards allows register nurses and the public to have a clear understanding of what needs to be met in order to insure that there is proper patient safety. However there are still many issues that contribute to unacceptable patient safety, including medication administration errors, post operative care, and patients mental health. However, “medication errors are one of the most common types of medical errors that occur in healthcare institutions” (J.Choo, 2010). A medication error, according to The National Coordinating Council for Medication Error Reporting and Prevention “is any preventable event that may cause or lead to inappropriate medication use or patient harm while the medication is in the control of the health care professional, patient or

The words medication error elicit fear in every nurse. According to Stefanacci and Riddle (2016), preventable medication errors are responsible for third reason of death apart from heart disease and cancer in the United States. As a nurse, it is important to obtain skills and knowledge to prevent them as these errors could result in extended hospitalisation of patients, simultaneously a burden of health care cost. These errors could be reduced by identifying the problems which lead to medication errors and following certain protocols in a coordinated environment.

Medication administration errors is not only a problem in the United States but is a global concern of managers and healthcare professionals (Department of Health, 2004;

After evaluating the incident, I found that the negative aspect of the incident was that after administering the wrong dose of insulin the patient was at a major risk and that the duty of care was not performed well. The positive aspects of this incident were that I learnt the importance of checking the medication chart thoroughly and paying more attention to the numbers and units in the chart. It is also safe to administer medication using the five rights of medication administration, such as the right patient, the right medication, the right dose, the right time and the right route (Medication Handling in NSW Public Health facilities, 2013). (Cheragi, Manoocheri & Eshani, 2013) have stated that medication errors tend to occur from nurses due to, tiredness, carelessness, high workload, stress and poor communication and as well as having a poor knowledge and

A medication error is “any preventable event that may cause or lead to inappropriate medication use or patient harm while the medication is in the control of the health care professional, patient, or consumer” (U.S. Food and Drug Administration, 2015). Fortunately, many potential errors are discovered before a patient receives a medication however, some are not, which may cause adverse reactions or death.

Medication administration is a multi-step process that is handled by multiple healthcare professionals. It begins with the prescription that is transcribed mostly by the physician, then dispensed by the pharmacist, and ends with the administration of the medication by the nurse. Throughout this multi-step process, medication errors can occur at any stage of the medication administration process. As expressed by L. Cloete in “Reducing medication errors in nursing practice,” “One third of the errors that harm patients occur during the nurse administration phase: administering medication to patients is therefore a high-risk activity.” Because the nurse is responsible for administering medication to the patient, he/she is considered and viewed as the most accountable in regards to the patient’s safety. Medication errors are one of the most common medical errors that can result in an adverse event that may pose a serious threat to the patient’s safety and well-being. In the article, “An inside look into the factors contributing to medication errors in the clinical nursing practice,” Savvato and Efstratios defined and characterized medication error as “any preventable event that may cause or lead to inappropriate medication use or patient harm while the medication is in the control of the health care professional, patient, or consumer. Such events may be related to professional practice, health care products, procedures, and systems, including prescribing; order communication;

The study reported limitations due to it being based only in the United Kingdom and that there may be variances if the research was performed at other hospitals around the world. The most common medication administration error found was an incorrect omission (Cottney & Innes, 2015 page 65). The most frequent medication dispensing errors were: 1) wrong amount 2) wrong method 3) wrong time. During the study four factors were found to amplify medication dispensing errors. They were: 1) nurse interruptions 2) increased PRN doses given 3) high patient volume 4) high volume of medications scheduled. The research also shows when using the direct observation method, the error rate spotted does not differ between study durations, having numerous evaluators or when the evaluator steps in to avoid a potential medication administration error to the patient.

About1.5 million people are harmed yearly in the U.S. because of medication errors, The National Coordinating Council for Medication Error Reporting and Prevention (NCCMERP) defines the meaning of medication error, they define it as “any preventable event that may cause or lead to inappropriate medication use or patient harm while the medication is in the control of the health care professional, patient, or consumer…”. (Stoppler, 2015) It is a serious topic in the nursing field that should be addressed and prevented.