Blunder in the Treatment Procedure - Essay Example

A medication error can be defined as a blunder in the treatment procedure that has led to or can potentially result in adverse effects on the patient’s health (Spath, 2011).

They can also be classified from a contextual perspective, in terms of the medicines, time, place, and people involved (Spath, 2011). Modal classification is the third type, which refers to how the error took place, for example, errors can occur by substitution, omission, or repetition.

These errors are accompanied by an increased cost of treatment, in addition to several moral consequences. Several barriers concerned with patient safety and medication errors have been identified. These include poor leadership and the absence of feedback on incidences concerning these errors. Feedback would enable the medical system to monitor the occurrence of these errors on a national level, and assist the authorities in formulating the appropriate preventative measures. Voluntary reporting systems have been created by organizations such as the Institute of Safe Medical Practice Canada (ISMP Canada) and results have shown that these systems can help reduce the number of mistakes in medication from human error (David, n.d).

Medication error reports are reviewed by the Division of Medication Error Prevention and Analysis (DMEPA) (US Food and Drug Administration, n.d). It includes a prevention program that evaluates cases of medical errors, and casualties, and uses this data to formulate preventative measures against medication errors. Fortunately, most medication errors are due to omission as opposed to commission; hence, there is a certain level of preventability for the occurrence of these mistakes. To formulate preventative measures, one must analyze the underlying cause of these errors. These errors usually occur upon the failure of a medical service provider to detect the state of disease, hence, prescribing the incorrect drug therapy, failure to detect the mechanism of drug interaction, negligence to patient’s drug allergies, and general patient knowledge deficits (Harn, n.d). The above-mentioned errors can be avoided if time is taken to counsel the prescriber and improve his/her working conditions (Harn, n.d).

In order for the prescriber to reduce the probability of medication errors occurring, he/she can learn ways to keep focused on the patient and make sure a diagnosis is made without any external distractions. The work performed by medical professionals can be extremely stressful at times and these conditions make them prone to making mistakes. Creating a stress-free environment can help reduce the number of errors. This can be achieved by reducing the amount of caffeine intake and maintaining a healthy diet, improving relations among employees, ensuring that the employees get adequate sleep, working goals should be realistic to avoid overworking employees and bad habits, such as alcohol intake, should be prohibited during or before working hours. The patient can also play a role in preventing medication errors by gaining knowledge on the medication that has been prescribed to him/her. He or she should be aware of the purpose of the medication and what disease he/she is taking the medication for.
The patient should also try to use the same pharmacy for one prescription, this way pharmacists can detect any inconsistencies that the doctor might have made by mistake. The patient should also take all his or her previous prescriptions to all appointments.    Attention should also be paid to the diagnosis of the patient as this can influence not only the drug prescribed but the dose in which it must be taken. Nurses should also avoid writing medication using abbreviations as this can result in misinterpretation when a different practitioner reads the document. Nurses should also be aware of medications that can have fatal adverse effects when used incorrectly. This way they can be very attentive when a patient is prescribed such drugs. Nurses should also modify the patient’s drug regime after every doctor’s visit.

As nurses usually have contact with a patient and his/her medical records, they are expected to be the first to detect and report medical errors. Reporting systems make the procedure more convenient and a majority of errors are reported via incident reports. There are personal barriers that a nurse has to overcome; these include embarrassment, fear, and the willpower to report the incident that occurred.

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