Using snowball sampling method with nurses to understand medication administration errors.

Area of Science:

• Nursing Practice
• Patient Safety
• Medication Errors

Background:

• Drug administration errors are frequent but underreported.
• There is a need for effective methods to encourage nurses to report medication errors.
• Understanding error circumstances is crucial for improving patient safety.

Purpose of the Study:

• To encourage nurses to report drug administration errors.
• To understand the circumstances surrounding medication errors.
• To identify high-alert situations in drug administration.

Main Methods:

• Snowball sampling was used to recruit 85 nurses.
• A semi-structured questionnaire collected data on error types, circumstances, and reporting.
• Data included error discovery, patient consequences, and reporting rates.

Main Results:

• 328 errors (259 actual, 69 near misses) were reported, most in medical-surgical wards.
• Wrong drugs and doses were the leading errors; 16.2% of actual errors had adverse effects.
• High-alert situations included administering KCl, insulin, Pitocin, using IV pumps, and CPR.

Conclusions:

• Snowball sampling effectively encouraged nurses to report medication errors.
• Empirical data identified specific high-alert situations requiring attention.
• Strategies for reducing drug administration errors, including double-checking in high-alert situations, are suggested.