Reporting medication errors is beneficial to improve the learning process for nurses. The factors of workload, ineffective communication, and distraction all contribute to medication errors (Sears et al., 2013). Nurses often excuse the behavior of colleagues when a medication error occurs, or nurses will pass the buck to a senior nurse to report the medication error (Haw, Stubbs and Dickens, 2014). Implementing a no blame policy for reporting medication errors, and providing nurses with the knowledge and training to report medication errors will result in an increase of medication errors reported.
To create an environment where these errors are a rare occurrence, all healthcare professionals must dedicate themselves to implementing QSEN's six core competencies each and every day. These professionals must also speak up when they see room for improvement in their workplace. Regardless of the healthcare setting or demographic of patients, safe outcomes are the purpose of providing patient-centered care. Since nurses are the largest subgroup of healthcare professionals, their ability to make strides towards improved medication administration is undeniable. As the nursing code of ethics states, nurses have the duty to protect the health and safety of those in their care (Winland-Brown, Lachman, O'Connor Swanson, 2015). By taking extra caution to administer medications correctly, this honorable obligation will always be within
Nurses are critical for promoting health in the society. The profession is highly flexible, since they specialize in diverse operations in the medical field. Registered nurses, for instance, are responsible for the administration of medicine and inoculations to patients (American Nurses ' Association, 2000). Additionally, these professionals observe, record, and enlighten doctors of any changes in a patient’s health. Nurses interpret and evaluate diagnostic examinations to determine an individual’s condition, as well as making the necessary adjustments in patient treatment plans on their health progress. In collaboration with other medical personnel, nurses engage in the development and enactment of patient care plans. Furthermore, they provide education to families and groups on various health issues such as disease prevention, among others.
An ineffective communication can lead to errors in patient’s misdiagnosis and even medication on admission, during hospital stay, and after discharge, and whether these errors were potentially harmful. Medication use is potentially dangerous. Polypharmacy is increasing, and makes it harder to keep track of side effects and interactions and of potentially inappropriate drug combinations. “The risk of serious consequences, hospitalization, and death due to medication errors increases with patients’ age and number of medications (Scand J Prim Health Care, 2012)”. For example, the GP is supposed to monitor the patient's regular medication, but does not always do so. Lack of monitoring and keeping track of patients’ medication use is a main cause when a patient is given inappropriate drugs. When the nurse fails to communicate successfully with patients, it costs. It costs in unnecessary pain, in avoidable deaths, in poor health outcomes and in the prolongation of
Confidentiality is an ethical value that remains deeply rooted in the nursing profession and has always been the cornerstone of the nurse-patient relationship. Since the days as nursing students, we were constantly reminded of the significance in maintaining patient’s confidentiality.
Compliance management in a complicated and ever expanding portion of the Health Information Management (HIM) field. As federal, state and local laws are created and revised, HIM professionals must stay current of not only the regulations but also the consequences of non-compliance. Along with federal, state and local laws, attention must be paid to the guidelines of various accreditation and credentialing bodies.
One mistake can be caught on camera by those who are distrustful of nurses. Overall, Fowler article was extremely unsuccessful at pusadering her audience to take action and become a part of policy making in healthcare because of her structural errors and usage of irrelevant sources in a failed attempt to build credibility with her audience.
Healthcare systems have traditionally been constructed around hierarchical perspectives used to train healthcare professionals (Porter-O’Grady and Malloch, 2007). In such hierarchies, senior physicians are often put at the top with certain power distances between other professionals. This can lead to difficulties in patient management when the patients safety is in question, but the healthcare professional involved may be hesitant to question the physician’s treatment plan or are too intimidated to voice out their opinions. In a study of over 2000 healthcare professionals including nurses and pharmacists, nearly half of the respondents felt pressured into administering a medication for which they had concerns, despite previously questioning the prescriber regarding the safety of the order (Institute for Safe Medication Practices, 2004). This was due to feelings of intimidation by the prescriber and an inability to effectively communicate their concerns. This resulted in 7% of the respondents reporting involvement in a medication error during that past year. Good interpersonal skills and effective communication ensures that concerns regarding patient safety can be brought up without seemingly challenging the knowledge of the other healthcare
Moreover, several studies have been conducted to examine the effects of low nurse staffing on patients hospitalization experiences, as well as its effect on nurse careers in the long run. A recent study by Frith, Anderson, Tseng, and Fong (2012) to explore the relationship between nurse staffing and medication errors, demonstrated that medication errors were higher in a cardiac care unit and non-cardiac care unit when staffing levels were lower. In addition, Frith et al. (2012) pointed out that medication errors increase by 18% for every 20% decrease in nurse staffing below the average due to failure to follow medication administration protocol As mentioned earlier, nurses perform the last and the most important step of medication administration. Thus, having adequate time to assess each patient efficiently and following the medication rights is critical to provide safe patient care and prevent errors.
NU 413 Week 9 Discussion Board Post student response to Katie-Lynn Fournier by Kathryn Moultrie
The American Nurses Association estimates that up to 80% of serious medical errors involve miscommunication between caregivers when patients are transferred or handed off during shift report (ANA 2012). In the nursing profession change of shifts require the successful transfer of information from nurse to nurse to prevent medical errors and adverse events (Sullivan, 2010). Research shows that when patients are included and engaged in their health care there is greater potential to lead to measurable improvements in safety and quality of care. The purpose of this paper is to report results of an organized review of the literature which studied bedside reporting in the hospital
This paper proposes to outline the impact of a standardized bedside reporting system that involves the patient as opposed to the age-old report method conducted at the nurse’s station between only nurses. Evaluation of this impact includes quality
Chaboyer (2008) approved a research on bedside reporting and the grades show that bedside reporting perk up the quality of patient concern. Chaboyer’s (2008) crams that bedside reporting recover patient protection, for instance it recognized that nurses are capable enough to scrutinize things forbade to sign for or any malformation in the patients’ baseline annotations (P.Maxson, K.Derby, & D.Foss, 2012).
This assignment is a reflection of ethical dilemmas in nursing practice as a registered nurse; this paper is based on the group assignment which was completed for NURS3004. This reflection will include an explanation of the role that I portrayed in the group, the preparation that I did for the role, what could have been done differently, how this group assignment has impacted me in terms of working in a team and finally explain how this assignment will assist me in my future clinical practice as a newly registered nurse.
An event that was significant to me throughout clinical placement was when I forgot to introduce myself to a visually impaired client.