Verified Document

Using A Poster To Reduce Medication Errors Essay

Related Topics:

Identifying Effective Strategies to Reduce Medication Errors

Introduction

Nurses are responsible for the largest percentage of medication errors. Medication errors adversely affect more than 7 million patients, cost almost $21 billion and result in excess of one million emergency room visits and 3.5 million additional visits to doctors’ offices each year (Stoppler & Marks, 2018).

Research Question

Problem: Medication errors remain the leading cause of adverse incidents for inpatients in the United States.

Intervention: Develop and disseminate an attractive and informative poster that underscores the severity of the problem and its causes, and provides nursing staff with the mnemonic five “rights” of medication administration (i.e., right patient, the right drug, the right dose, the right route and the right time). Nursing supervisors were requested to hang The posters in a prominent location at all nursing stations (see below).

Comparison: A comparison of medication error rates following the dissemination of the poster with benchmarked data.

Outcome: The outcome of this intervention is expected to have a positive effect on medication error rates.

Purpose

The purpose of this initiative was to identify effective strategies for reducing medication errors that can result in extended inpatient stays or even death.

Results

Based on the average monthly error rate using patient incident reports for the 6 months preceding the initiative, the poster contributed to a 28% reduction in the number of medication errors made in the target hospital.

Implications for Nursing

Posters are a highly cost effective strategy for reducing mediation errors. Many if not most tertiary healthcare facilities have in-house graphics departments that can support these types of initiatives.

References

Stoppler, M. C. & Marks, J. W. (2018) The most common medication errors. MedicineNet. Retrieved from https://www.medicine net.com/drugs_the_most_common_ medication_errors/views.htm.

Cite this Document:
Copy Bibliography Citation

Related Documents

Opportunities to Reduce Medication Errors
Words: 1456 Length: 5 Document Type: Term Paper

" The right route Likewise, this clinician advises, "The administrator must give the medication via the right route. In preparing the medication, the triple check will identify the route to be given on the medication order." The right time Penultimately, double-checking the time is required: "The administrator will check the medication order to ensure that the medication is given at the right time. The prescriber will identify the times that the medication is to

Medication Errors
Words: 1248 Length: 4 Document Type: Term Paper

Identifying Opportunities to Reduce Medication Error Rates by Nursing Staff Today, one of the most challenging problems facing nurses practicing in any setting, but most especially tertiary healthcare facilities, is the adverse drug reactions caused by medication errors. Although medication errors can occur at numerous stages of care during hospitalization and outpatient follow-up, nurses are on the front lines in preventing these errors (Da Silva & Krishnamurthy, 2016). This is an

Accuracy in Medication Practice Improvement
Words: 1923 Length: 5 Document Type: Essay

Medication Practice Improvement Episode Medication Intercept An intravenous antibiotic Benzylpenicillin (Benpen) course was prescribed for a child to treat acute osteomyelitis. The 30mg/kg dose calculation was duly followed. The child weighed 28kg and so 840mg Benpen dose was to be given every six hours and this was charted accordingly. The chart showed these times: 06:00, 12:00, 18:00 and 24:00. Dose number two was to be taken at 14:00 and two RNs -registered

Patient Safety With Medication Reconciliation
Words: 719 Length: 2 Document Type:

Patient Safety Through Medication Reconciliation The adoption of the Affordable Healthcare Act has assisted an increasing number of Americans to have access to health insurance. Despite the benefits associated with the new law, the quality of health delivery is still low because of the issue such as medication errors. The poster recommends an implementation of medical reconciliation to improve the quality of healthcare delivery in the United States. The method of

Improving Medication Safety and Nursing Care
Words: 1193 Length: 4 Document Type: Essay

Patient safety is one of the key aspects of healthcare delivery and a critical component in determining the quality of healthcare services. Patient safety is influenced by many factors including medication safety, which is identified as one of the most common type of errors in nursing practice (Getnet & Bifftu, 2017). Given the increased focus on patient safety and better outcomes, nurses face the need to enhance medication safety and

Managing an Effective Quality Assurance
Words: 1092 Length: 4 Document Type: Research Paper

Reports from medical center services and committees concerning patient incidents are used to develop appropriate interventions. Trended data of patient incidents can point to shift and date where most incidents occur. Desired Outcome A 50% reduction in the number medication errors of all types over the next 12 months. Goals and Objectives to Facilitate Outcome The overarching goal of this program would be to reduce the number of medication errors in general and among those

Sign Up for Unlimited Study Help

Our semester plans gives you unlimited, unrestricted access to our entire library of resources —writing tools, guides, example essays, tutorials, class notes, and more.

Get Started Now