Drug errors and patient safety: the need for a change in practice

Concerns regarding drug errors and public safety have recently been raised in the British national newspapers and professional nursing journals. This literature review considers why nurses may continue to make drug errors in their practice. The findings suggest that drug errors are not caused by any one factor, but are multifaceted in nature. Factors include calculation error, overdosing/underdosing of drug dosages, covert drug administration in food and drink, and an increasingly relaxed attitude among professional nurses with regard to ensuring that drugs are administered to the standard required by law. This article considers the notion that nurses may breach the legal "duty of care" they owe patients by being complacent in their drug administration practice. Consideration of a system's approach to minimize drug error through proactive action planning, risk identification, and implementation of an anonymous incident-reporting framework is briefly explored.