MEDICATION SAFETY EDUCATION PROGRAM 1
Practice Question: Medication Safety Education Program to Reduce the Risk of Harm Caused by Medication Errors
The PICO project seeks to implement a medication safety education program to help reduce instances of medication errors in my practice setting. The project was selected in response to the high incidence of medication errors at the facility that has resulted in avoidable disability, death, and reputational issues. This project defines a medication error as any preventable event that may lead to or cause inappropriate use of medication and harm to the patient (Tariq et al., 2022). The facility already implements an alarm system that notifies nurses whenever they are required to administer drugs to patients. However, incidents of medication errors remain high, pointing to a need to consider additional strategies. The primary aim of the project is to determine whether a safety education program would yield greater efficacy than the current alarm system.
What is Currently Working?
Over the past three weeks, I have engaged in a series of meetings with the facilitys management team and employees to determine the scope of the problem, inform them about the projects objectives, and develop a plan for the education program. The meetings with the staff were aimed at obtaining their views about the problem in the organization and understanding their expectations from the education program in line with the democratic leadership philosophy. In the first week, the management gave the authorization to begin the medication safety education program at the facility.
The proposed project involves educating nurses on safe medication administration. The management decided to begin the education program with nurses, and then later roll out the same to other medical practitioners, including physicians and pharmacists. The education is...
…of safety among staff in their daily interactions with patients (Alhadhey et al., 2014).Further Changes to Consider in Addressing the Problem
Various sources contend that addressing the problem of medication errors requires a multifaceted approach that integrates multiple strategies. Thus, in addition to the medication safety education program, the hospital could consider other strategies such as replacing handwritten prescriptions with computerized physician order entries to minimize risks of prescription errors associated with illegible physician handwriting (Benjamin, 2003). Further, some errors may not be a result of lack of knowledge, but due to miscommunication among healthcare professionals, where different practitioners give patients different information (Benjamin, 2003). As such, there may be a need to consider investing in seamless and computerized integrated systems that allow for standardized communication between healthcare professionals (Benjamin, 2003). Studies have shown both of these strategies to be effective in reducing the risk…
References
Abukhader, I., & Abukhader, K. (2020). Effect of Medication Safety Education Program on Intensive Care Nurses’ Knowledge Regarding Medication Errors. Journal of Biosciences and Medicines, 8(6), Doi: 10.4236/jbm.2020.86013 Alhadhey, H., Mahmoud, M. A., Hassali, M.,…& Bates, D. W. (2014). Challenges to and the Future of Medication Safety in Saudi Arabia: A Qualitative Study. Saudi Pharmaceutical Journal, 22(4), 326-32.
Benjamin, D. M. (2003). Reducing Medication Errors and Increasing Patient Safety: Case Studies in Clinical Pharmacology. Journal of Clinical Pharmacology, 43(7), 768-83.
Tariq, R. A., Vashisht, R., Sinha, A., & Scherbak, Y. (2022). Medication Dispensing Errors and Prevention. Treasure Island, FL: StatPearls Publishing.
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