Analysis of Medication Errors – Medication errors are a common occurrence within the health care system. This poses a significant risk to patients, and often results in considerable expenses to the organization. While errors in healthcare are inevitable (Shams, 2017), there are steps nurses and their organizations can take to decrease the frequency of medication errors, creating a safer health care system for patients. This paper will explain the gravity of medication errors in health care, analyze causes for these errors, discuss who this issue impacts, and propose solutions to improve patient safety during medication administration. The ethical background of the proposed solutions will also be discussed. This paper will conclude with a summary of the above content.
Analyze a Current Health Care Problem or Issue – Medication Errors
A literature review was conducted to explore the causes and proposed solutions to medication errors. The article compilation included three peer-reviewed published articles from distinguished health and nursing journals. The complexity of causative factors surrounding medication errors is to be considered when analyzing an extensive concern such as this. The causes presented have a focus on registered nurses as well as intravenous (IV) drug administration within critical care units. In an article written by Paparella and Mandrack (2016), the authors discuss medication errors in IV drug administration. Utilizing a literature review to develop their study, they concluded a common factor in the occurrence of IV medication errors was a lack of education on the preparation and administration of the drug. Research conducted by Simone et al. (2016) focused on IV drug errors within critical care units as the many of the drugs given to the patients within those units are high risk. This research also concluded that continuing education on pharmaceuticals and drug administration was a key to preventing medication errors. Another study interviewed nurses and nursing students to explore their viewpoints on medication errors. They reported causative factors to include lack of pharmaceutical education, heavy workloads of critical patients, and unsafe nursing ratios (Gorgich, Barforshan, Ghoreishi, & Yaghoobi, 2016).
Impact of Medication Errors
The discussion and analysis of medication errors is highly relevant to those in the healthcare profession because it is a common cause of harm and even death to our patients. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (2018) report 1.3 million emergency room visits and 350,000 hospitalizations occur every year due to adverse drug effects, costing hospitals 3.5 billion dollars annually. They predict these statistics to continue growing due to the new pharmaceuticals and aging populations. Novice nurses are unfamiliar with many of the drugs used in practice. Factor in the workload of a nurse, anxiety, and lack of experience, and medication errors are almost certain to occur. When medication errors occur, the nurse who administered often feels extreme fear and guilt, leading to visceral reactions (Treiber & Jones, 2018). The patient could have a variety of reactions to the error, ranging from mild side effects to possible death. The hospital organizations face legal consequences and financial losses. Due to the considerable impact one error could have on multiple parties, the prevalence of medication errors is a significant and urgent matter to analyze and attempt to resolve.
Potential Solutions
Based on the literature compilation previously discussed, focus was directed towards solutions to lack of pharmaceutical education and heavy workloads for nurses. A call for continued education of nurses was clearly recommended by all the literature reviewed. With a growing number of new graduate nurses entering the workforce, nurse residency programs are an effective way to integrate new nurses into the field of nursing, while increasing job satisfaction, improve clinical decision making, and providing cost savings for the hospital (Blevins, 2016). Nurse residency programs allow a nurse to precept with a more experienced nurse, as well as continue education with a focus on their specific unit. Nurse residencies are a great opportunity to continue education on pharmaceutical administration safety specific to their unit, as well as provide simulation scenarios to practice skills in a controlled environment.
In a study conducted by Zimmerman and House (2016), a cost-analysis was conducted on simulation education and they concluded that hospitals woul …………..
