Medication Errors Research Paper

When it comes to medication errors several things may occur such as adverse drug event, unexpected deterioration, and even death in severe cases. AHRQ (2015) states, “an adverse drug event (ADE) is defined as harm experienced by a patient as a result of exposure to a medication, and ADEs account for nearly 700,000 emergency department visits 100,000 hospitalizations each year.” There are many ways that errors may occur such as dispensary errors, prescription errors

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

Medication errors are focused on: terms and definitions; incidence of and harm; risk factors; avoidance; disclosure, legalities & consequences (Wittich, Burkle & Lanier, 2014). Medication errors categories have been developed by the American Society of Health-System Pharmacists (ASHP). Examples of these categories are based on prescribing, omitting drugs not administered, timing, unauthorized drug, wrong dosage, wrong preparation, expired drug, not using laboratory data to monitor toxicity (Wittich, Burkle & Lanier, 2014). Additionally, this article examines in depth common causes leading to medication errors, drug nomenclature, similar sounding drugs, unapproved abbreviations and handwriting, medical staff shortages and manufacturer medication shortages. Even though this article provides an informative overview for physicians, other allied health personnel may benefit too. This is valuable knowledge for the health care professional not just physicians in order to provide safe care for their

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.

For many patients the scariest part of being in the hospital is having to rely on other people to control your life changing decisions. One large part of this is the medications one is given while in our care. I can only imagine what it must be like for patients to have a stranger to come in and start administering drugs to me. This would be especially scary if I did not know what these medications did, or what negative effects could be caused by taking them. Unfortunately, the fear of medication errors that many patients have are not unfounded. Estimates range from 1.5 to 66 million patients a year have medication errors occur while they are in the care of health care professionals. Considering all of the technology we have at our

Researchers have identified that hospitalized patients are subject to one medication administration error per day, implying that approximately 1.5 million preventable drug event arise yearly in the United State. Medication errors are among the most common medical error, costing more than 3.5 billion

Medication errors are a reoccurring issue that has plagued the medical field since the beginning of drug administration. In order to understand how to handle medication errors, one must first understand what a medication error is. The concept of medication error can be defined as: “any preventable event that may cause or lead to inappropriate medication use or harm to a patient” (Kee, 2012, 125). Examples of medication errors include: misreading a patient’s medical file, not clarifying illegible prescriptions, an incomplete patient assessment, confusing look-alike and sound-alike medications, and lack of better understanding if a medication can be crushed or split. To better understand medication errors and medication safety one must understand the impact it can have on the medical community and patient care, ways to prevent medication errors, and what should be done in a situation where a medication error has occurred.

Medication errors are a big deal because you are at risk of ending someone's life by a simple mistake because you didn't recheck the medication you are administering to the patient. In 2007, a nine year old named Alyssa Hemmelgarn became sick and she kept taking medicine but wasn't getting any better. She was sick with swollen glands and cold sores. When Alyssa and her mother went to the doctors , the doctor diagnosed her with leukemia. A week passed by and she was getting treatment. Seems like she was getting better with all the medication she has been taking until one day she started receiving the symptoms and soon after passed away in the hospital. It turns out that the doctor noted her as “anxious” so they medicated her with ativan. The

Risk factors for harmful medication errors reported include the usage of institute of safe medication practices (ISMP) high alert medications, inaccuracy of delivery devices and during the prescription phase of the medication administration process. According to the Harvard Medical Practice study 30% (thirty percent) of patients with medication related injuries died or were disabled for more than six months. (Carlson, 2001, p.18.)

al. 2013). (What did this study show?)According to a study conducted at The Congenital Heart Disease Centre at the University Hospital of Wales a medication error reporting system was established to determine the incidence and consequences of medication errors, establish changes in policy and practices to prevent recurrent medication errors, and improve patient safety (Wilson, R.G. McArtney, Newcombe, R.J. McArtney, Gracie, Kirk, & Stuart 1998). They established a Medication Error (ME) committee composed of one senior attending, one junior doctor, one nurse from each clinical area and a senior pharmacist. The ME committee met every three months to review the reports. Three categories were composed; prescription errors, administration errors and supply errors. They were also categorized as serious meaning capable of producing organ damage or death or not serious. During a 24 month period there were 682 admissions to the Congenital Heart Disease Centre medication errors were submitted by doctors, nurses, and pharmacists. According to the reports doctors were among the highest at 72% while nurses had 22% and only 5% from the pharmacist. The prescription errors were 68%, administration errors were 25% and supply errors were least at 7% and were due to inadequate provision of stock. During this two year study the amount of errors that were reported to the ME had decreased by the second year (Wilson et. al.

An analysis by the World Health Organization stipulated medication errors 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, product labelling, packaging, and nomenclature, compounding, dispensing, distribution, administration, education, monitoring, and use" (WHO, 2016). This particular interpretation is expansive and proposes that errors may be preventable at different levels. Errors in the administration of medications have also been described as a decrease in the likelihood of treatment in being prompt and effective, or as an "elevation in the risk of harm relative to medicines and prescribing compared with generally accepted practice" (Lisby, Nielsen, Brock, Mainz,

There are a lof ways to prevent medication errors for example ISMP is something being used to prevent those medication errors, and it stands for the Institute for Safe Medication Practices and it is based on suburban Philadelphia. ISMP started about 35 years ago and it has always been the foundation of its medication error prevention efforts a volunteer practitioner will use error reporting-program to learn about all the errors that happen across the nation part of their job is to understand all the causes and share all the lessons that will help the healthcare community, and they are also responsible for reviewing all the medication error reports submitted by healthcare facilities to the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania Patient Safety Authority.

I have learned many interesting things while doing my research on medication errors. I now know more about the kind of medication errors that affect people the most, ways to prevent, adverse effects that can cause the death of the patient, and many more. Something that I have discovered that has really surprised me, is the number of medication errors that happen each year in the U.S. The FDA(Food and drug administration) has confirmed that there are over 1.25 million medication errors made annually in the United States. That is a crazy high number. I was also very surprised to learn that almost one in five medications administered is given in error. That is 20%!!! Crazy!!!!

Medication error is one of the biggest problems in the healthcare field. Patients are dying due to wrong drug or dosage. Medication error is any preventable incident that leads to inappropriate medication use or harms the patient while the medication is in the control of the health care professional,or patient (U.S. Food and Drug Administration, 2015). It is estimated about 44,000 inpatients die each year in the United States due to medication errors which were indeed preventable (Mahmood, Chaudhury, Gaumont & Rust, 2012). There are many factors that contribute to medication error. However, the most common that factors are human factors, right patient information, miscommunication of abbreviations, wrong dosage. Healthcare providers do not intend to make medication errors, but they happen anyways. Therefore, nursing should play a tremendous role to reduce medication error