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An urban medical system's exploratory study of medication errors.
Skip G Morelock1, Jeffrey D Kirk2
1Collin College School of Nursing McKinney Texas.
Nursing Open
|August 2, 2019
Summary
Medication errors commonly involved antibiotics and dose omissions, with severity level 2 requiring increased monitoring. No significant differences were found between day and night shifts regarding error severity.
Area of Science:
- Healthcare Quality and Safety
- Clinical Pharmacy
- Patient Safety
Background:
- Medication errors pose a significant risk to patient safety in healthcare settings.
- Identifying patterns in medication errors is crucial for developing effective prevention strategies.
Purpose of the Study:
- To identify patterns of medication errors, including shifts, day of week, unit, severity, medication class, and causes.
- To propose potential solutions for reducing medication errors.
Main Methods:
- Retrospective explorative study of 605 medication events from two medical centers.
- Analysis of medication type, error severity, time of order, unit, and day of the week.
- Simple percentages and point-biserial correlation were used for data analysis.
Main Results:
- Antibiotics were the most frequent medication class involved in errors.
- Dose omission was the most common cause of medication errors.
- Severity level 2, requiring increased patient monitoring, was the most reported severity.
Conclusions:
- Dose omissions and errors involving antibiotics are key areas for intervention.
- Targeted strategies are needed to address the most common causes and classes of medication errors.
- Further research may explore specific interventions to reduce these prevalent error types.