Nursing Student Medication Errors, Research Paper Example

Background of Study

The article highlights how medical errors are significant within the profession and the use of Root Cause Analysis (RCA) to better understand the factors that contribute towards the occurrence of the medical errors. There is a general lack of uniformity in the quality of services that patients receive despite the set standards. This has been characterized by different levels of employee qualification, experience and satisfaction in different medical institutions.

The problem of medical errors within the medical profession is of considerable significance. According to a number of studies, medical errors have been attributed with a number of emotional and financial costs to the physicians, patients, medical institutions and government. As such, this research is integral in helping to determine the root causes of medical errors to mitigate or avert their recurrence.

The purpose of this study is to provide a conceptual framework towards the issue of medical errors in medical institutions. It provides the different interest areas that have been identified by nurses and physicians as the potential and underlying triggers of the occurrence of errors when administering medication to patients in hospitals.

The main objective of the study is to identify the important components to awareness, which are; recognizing errors, reporting them in a non-threatening environment, analyze the source, and procedure change according to lessons learned and continued monitoring.

The study highlights a number of concepts and phenomena that are associated with the occurrence of errors in the administration of medicine. The main influential factors include; (1) the ability to recognize errors in time, (2) the organizational culture as regards reporting medical errors, (3) ability to analyze the source of the error, (4) the ability to foster the adequate change and (5) the ability to employ monitoring techniques to keep track of the identified triggers of medical administration errors.

Methodology

The research mainly employs a blend of quantitative and qualitative research method. Owing to the fact that the study looks at previous literature regarding the issue of the occurrence of errors in the administration of medicine, its data, information and data sample come from the studies that have been focused on. As such, there is both quantitative and qualitative data used in the analysis and development of study findings.

The study employs a meta-analysis study design. This is because the research employed secondary data that was collected from other studies conducted. As such, the participants are not adequately described in terms of the population. The population that was used in all the other studies that have been sourced had a wide variety of characteristics that made human social interaction analysis possible. There is no existing inclusion and exclusion criteria employed in the study.

There is no definitive sample size that is employed in this research. The study relies on analysis conducted by other previous studies. As such, the sample cannot be definitively defined as a representative of the population. There is no support that the sample size guarantees statistical power, though the statistical power can be inferred from the average cumulative statistical power of all studies employed in the research. However, this sampling method is justified relative to the study question. In order to ensure an adequate representation of the population, a wide variety of studies will have to be employed. The procedures mainly involved collecting research studies from nine electronic databases, limiting the searches to the period between 1985 and May 2013.

Results

According to the research, the most common causes of errors in the administration of medication were lapsed and slips as a result of human error. The second most common causes resulted from issues regarding knowledge in specific nursing concepts or procedures. Deliberate violations were also highlighted as considerable causes of errors in the administration of medicine. Others also include inadequate written communication, high   perceived   workload, interruptions/distractions during drug administration, problems with medicines supply and storage, staff health status, patient factors.

The study has significant implications in the management of errors in the administration of medication. Errors in the administration of medical errors have significant economic, emotional and psychological impacts on patients, nurses, physicians, medical institutions and the government. For this reason, this research has significant implications as regards the mitigation of the effects of medical administration errors.

This study is crucial in identifying, categorizing and prioritizing the risk factors that influence the occurrence of errors in the administration of medication within medical and health institutions. This study can significantly assist in the development of preventive measures in the nursing practice as far as the administration of drugs is concerned. This can also be integrated into the nursing syllabus, top provide new and upcoming professionals with the required knowledge to tackle challenges in the workplace that may potentially trigger errors in the administration of medicine.

Ethical Considerations

As a meta-analytic study, the research mainly employs research and information from other studies that have been conducted previously. As such, there is very little consideration to ethical aspects in the research. By virtue of the other studies having taken ethical standards of research into consideration, by default, this study lies within the confines of ethical principles in medical and nursing research.

The study effectively protects patient privacy by virtue of all the other studies employed in the meta-analysis meeting this criteria. Confidentiality of patient information is observed as the study does not employ any compromising information pertaining to the patients involved in the studies within the meta-analysis. This was done by resorting to anonymity so as to protect the participants from harm as well as maintain confidentiality by sealing out of public knowledge the research findings of personal information. The study lies within the ethical confines of nursing research by virtue of the studies being randomly picked, each having obtained the consent of its participants before the process begun. This was to assure honesty and voluntary involvement in the study.

Conclusion

The study is generally limited by virtue of the representation of the samples employed by the other research employed. The article has taken into consideration a number of studies initially conducted on the cause and effects of errors in the administration of medication. However, these studies do not take into consideration the adequate representation of the population.

The study is validated by virtue of previous research conducted on the topic have arrived to similar conclusions, that errors in the administration of medication to patients results from human factors. However, it cannot be considered reliable as a result of inadequate population representation. However, I would include this study as a piece of evidence on the causes and effects of errors in administration of mediation.

References

Dolansky, M. A. (2013, March). Nursing student medication errors: a case study using root cause analysis. Journal of Professional Nursing, 29(2), 102-108.

Hall, L. M., Ferguson-Pare?, M., Peter, E., White, D., Besner, J., Chisholm, A., . . . Hemingway, A. (2010). Going blank: factors contributing to interruptions to nurses’ work and related outcomes. Journal of Nursing Management, 18(8), 1040-1047.

Keers, R. N., Williams, S. D., Cooke, J., & Ashcroft, D. M. (2013). Causes of medication administration errors in hospitals: a systematic review of quantitative and qualitative evidence. Drug Safety, 36(11), 1045-1067.

McKeon, C. (2006). Organizational factors: impact on administration violations in rural nursing. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 55(1), 115-123.

Novek, J., Bettess, S., Burke, K., & Johnston, P. (2000). Nurses’ perceptions of the reliability of an automated medication dispensing system. Journal of Nursing Care Quality, 14(2), 1-13.