Enhancing Medication Safety: Reducing Administration Errors in Oncology Setting.

Area of Science:

• Oncology
• Patient Safety
• Healthcare Quality Improvement

Background:

• Medication errors pose a significant risk in oncology settings.
• Safe medication administration is crucial for patient outcomes.
• Improving these processes is a key healthcare quality objective.

Purpose of the Study:

• To minimize medication errors in an oncology setting.
• To enhance safe medication administration practices.
• To improve patient safety in Muscat, Oman.

Main Methods:

• A one-group pretest-posttest quasi-experimental design was used.
• Interventions focused on medication management, HIS, environment, and education.
• The FOCUS PDCA methodology guided the project from Q2 2022 to Q1 2023.

Main Results:

• Medication error rates decreased from 12.59 to 5.26 per 1000 patient days.
• Medication administration error rates declined from 5.39 to 1.29 per 1000 patient days.
• Both reductions were statistically significant (p=0.035 and p=0.044, respectively).

Conclusions:

• Interventions led to significant improvements in patient safety.
• The study demonstrates the effectiveness of targeted strategies in reducing medication errors.
• Enhanced medication management practices are vital for oncology patient care.