| Abstract |
Introduction: Nursing science is constantly evolving. However, errors occurrence in the administration of drugs by nurses is a common phenomenon that is usually caused due to the workload and the stressful working conditions. Given the fact that patient safety is the top priority of nursing care provided and that nursing errors are an important indicator of low patient safety, the study of this phenomenon is particularly important.
Objective: The objective of this study is to record the most common medication errors and to look for the factors that lead to such errors in medication administration.
Methodology: The present cross-sectional observational study was conducted at the General University Hospital of Heraklion, Crete (PAGNI), during the period March-May 2021. The study was based on the methodology of cross-sectional studies and was carried out via questionnaires. The final control group of the study consisted of 99 participants (99% response rate). In order to collect the data, we used the questionnaire of Mitsis et al. (2012), the duration of which is around 10-15 minutes and consists of questions about demographics (5 questions), regarding the factors responsible for the occurrence of errors (14 questions), for the management of these errors (10 questions) and questions of personal views on the subject (3 questions). Statistical analysis was limited to descriptive statistics using total numbers (n) and percentages (%), via IBM SPSS software.
Results: According to the results of the research, the most common medication error occurring when administering drugs is the administration to the wrong patient (27.3%). Other common errors are the administration of the wrong drug (24.2%), the incorrect time of administration (17.2%) and the administration of the incorrect dose (17.2%o). The main factors that contribute to the occurrence of a medication error, are: a) the high workload of nurses, b) the high degree of burnout they experience and c) the frequent distraction of nurses' attention during the administration of medication to a patient. In addition, the main reason for hiding an error is the nurse's own judgment that it is often not important to report (54.5%), while the fear of sanctions follows (27.3%). Asking the nurses themselves whether they believe (and to what extent) that
School of Medicine - University of Crete
the errors occur mainly due to system failure rather than individual responsibility, the views were mixed. The majority of responses was at moderately or high levels of agreement (31.3% & 30.3% respectively). Subsequently, opinions seemed to converge on the fact that systematic recording of errors would improve clinical nursing and care (89.9%o), and finally, the majority agreed that this recording would also be used to render individual liability to a large and very large extent (54.5% & 27.3% respectively). Finally, improving working conditions (adequate staffing, consistent working hours) and continuous training of nursing staff are some of the practices that may, according to the nurses themselves, reduce the incidence of such errors' occurrence in clinical nursing.
Conclusions: Research has shown, there is a wide range of common errors that are often hidden and increase the likelihood of reduced quality of patient care or even risk to their life. System failures - such as inadequate staffing, excessive workload and the complexity of clinical decision making - are some of the causes and must be addressed by decision makers. At the same time, individual and group measures within the nursing team should be discussed. Using a list of common errors, is considered to be helpful in this regard.
|
Search
