Nurses Are Given Much Responsibility During Patient Care.

Nurses are responsible for multiple patients on any given day making medication errors a potential problem in the nursing field. Medication administration not only encompasses passing medication to the patients yet begins with the physician prescribing the medication, pharmacy filling the correct prescription and ending with the nurse administering and monitoring the patient for any adverse effect from the medication. According to the National Coordinating Council for Medication Error Reporting and Prevention (NCCMERP), ‘A medication error refers to any preventable event that may cause or lead to inappropriate medication use or patient harm while the medication is in the control of the healthcare professional,

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 administration is one of the first key elements you learn in nursing school. The standard is held high as the clinical instructors ask you to validate why you are giving a medication, what exactly it does, and to make sure that your patient meets the criteria to receive a medication. They watch you check the medication three times before it gets to a patient’s body, ensuring it is correct. However, medication errors stand as the third leading cause of death in the United States. There are endless reasons as to why this is the case, but Brian R. Malone keys in on the idea of “Intimidating Behavior Jeopardizing Medication Safety” How does the demeanor of medication providers effect those administering it? The purpose of this paper is to summarize the thoughts and ideas Malone discusses about the behavior, actions, and words that lead nurses and pharmacists to administer medications that cause adverse events and jeopardize patient safety.

of the nursing team. Medication errors were not reported back to the nurse manager due to fear

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

Nursing medication errors were examined by having nurses take surveys based on their perception of why medication errors are occurring as well as visiting their work setting and observing any errors. Nurses are encouraged to take precaution when administering medications to ensure that the correct medication as well as the dose, is given to the correct patient. It is imperative for hospitals to enforce medication stipulations to ensure that nurses are double checking medication labels. Studies show that causes of medication errors are due to nurse’s not understanding protocol, administration errors related to overworked weary

Another causative issue to medication error was poor staff knowledge about medications. 46% (n=32) of registered nurses and 37% (n=15) of student nurses stated that not having enough knowledge about medications increases the risk for creating an error. It is essential for the person passing meds to identify potential side effects, the drug type, contraindication and it interactions to reduce the patient may encounter for taking the medication. The qualitative review of registered nurses reinforced this issue.

Edwards and Axe (2015), found that nurses not only need to understand the issues related to the administration of drugs given but also aware of the full medication journey. The journey starts with the doctor writing the prescription, pharmacist looking over the medication and putting the order together, then nurses double-checking before giving it to their patient. Drug errors can occur at any point, nurses need to be on their toes at all times while giving medication. Drug errors can include the wrong quantity being prescribed, the drug being intended for another patient, poor labeling and storage, and out of date drugs NPSA, (2007). Jones and Treiber (2010) found that illegible or unclear physician handwriting and staff not following the five rights had the highest percentage of why drug errors occur.

One of the many responsibilities of a nurse is administering medications. Improper transcription, dispensing, administering, and reporting can result in medication errors. The article Simple Steps to Reduce Medication Errors recognizes how detrimental errors can be to the patient and the facility (Chu, 2016). An error in medication can lead to an extended stay for the patient, resulting in serious harm or death.

Three primary concerns are medication mistakes, the aspect of good patient care, and the nurses’ reputation (Mandatory, 2003).

Going back to 2007, there were nearly 73,000 medication errors reported to the National Patient Safety Agency. 73,000 errors is far too many regardless whether there was harm done to the patient or not (Nute, 2014). According to a study done in 2009, the majority of the errors came from unclear or wrong dosage, wrong medication, delayed or omitted medication, wrong route, and giving medication to the wrong patient, with unclear or wrong dosage being the number one cause. One of the things that is being implemented now is the use of the five rights. A nurse or healthcare provider is required to administer the right patient the right medication at the right time using the right route and the right dose. This appeared to be the perfect solution to the problem until further studies were performed. The five rights provided some reduction in the number of medication errors but it did not solve the many steps that are to be taken before administering the medication to the patient. One of the most important tasks that needs to be met is knowing the medication before it is

Mion and Sandhu (2016) stated “at the individual level, nurses must practice safe medication administration behaviors prior to every administration of every medication: compare the medication to the medical administration record, label the medication throughout the process, check two forms of patient identification, immediate documentation, and explain to patient” (p. 154). By following the 7 rights of medication administration, nurses can reduce the number medication errors. Nurses are held accountable for the medication that they are administering and must “continually

Reviewing the common errors and issues nurses are faced with can help reduce the amount of overall medication errors made. A study in a Swedish hospital revealed great insights about what exactly goes wrong during medication administration by registered nurses. The study was conducted in a 1000 bed university hospital; samples were taken from three separate units. “For the purposes of this study, MA accuracy was defined as a medication dose administered exactly as ordered by the doctor.” (Gunningberg, Poder, Donaldson, &, Swenne, 2014)

The sampling was of 38 nurses and a convenience sample was used. Contributing factors to medication errors included nurses tired and exhausted, physician’s writing illegible, and nurses distracted/ interrupted. Distraction may lead to not completing the “five rights” of medication administration. Poor communication was also perceived as a reason for error. Preventative measures were listed as following the five rights and a computerized system for prescribing and documenting

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