The Positive Aspect Of Barcoding In Patient Safety - Essay Example

The Positive Aspect Of Bar Coding In Patient Safety Abstract: Doctors are advanced to 21st century medication but they are still in the 19th century filing system , were the words of George W Bush , the words that is very apt to describe the need of the hour, use of technology in health care with the ultimate aim of serving for the people’s welfare. The information technology is playing an unbelievable role, bring in loads of changes, trying to create a safe, error free healthcare. This essay, shows how the barcode technology helps to reduce the human error in providing medication, thus enhancing the patient’s safety, the ultimate aim of health care. Introduction: The Institute of Medicine’s report, To err is Human: Building a safe healthcare system, in its report says that preventable medical errors cause up to 98,000 deaths and about 770,000 adverse events in US every year. This report was the base of the revolutionary introduction of bar code technology in pharmaceuticals, FDA and hospitals. Another research conducted by FDA predicts that by the implementation of barcode technology for the bedside medication, close to 500,000 adverse drug reactions and blood transfusion errors over the next 20 years could be prevented. This shows the importance of a method to ensure patient safety. The barcode based patient identification and medication helps to set right the five basic steps in health care provision, namely the right patient, medication, dose, time and method of administration. The barcode is a simple technology that replaces the textual form of information. It serves as a key to database being the unique patient identification ID. In hospitals it is useful for nurses in diversified fields as medical administration, for correct blood administration, sample management, treatment, non medical applications etc. Now many hospitals are getting in the barcode technology implemented to positively help the patients at the same time bringing down the error rate. The patient safety is ensured in all areas of healthcare by implementing barcode. Particularly it is highly applicable in the nursing field, where patient safety is the primary focus. Many studies and researches are done in the nursing field to establish the effect of barcode technology in patient care in the nursing field, the points dealt in the review section.( Kohn, etal.,2000) Literature review: Now all Government entities are addressing medication safety through new regulations and legislation by urging the healthcare providers. the process that is behind the barcode is that , once a patient is bar coded, that become their unique ID for blood specimens, test orders, X-rays, billing and numerous medical and administrative hospital procedures can be accomplished quickly and accurately with a dramatically reduced potential for error. Thus technically there is a reduction in patient processing time throughout the facility and decrease in misreading and mis-keying of information along with saving the staff time. This is double sided advantage particularly in a phase of in an era of a nursing shortage. Patient reactions to the bar code wristband are positive with the reduced time and hassle in the admissions process. Patients feel that they are being cared for in an efficient, safe, high tech environment, and they respond favorably to it. Thus the Bar code is adopted by many healthcare institutions to ensure positive patient identification and to capture data for medication administration, point-of-care testing transfusion verification, specimen collection and tracking and patient charging There are many studies and researches reported on the effect of barcode on enhancing the patient safety. For example the Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Center after implementing the barcode technology between 1999- 2001in 161 medical centers reported marked decrease in medical errors and nurses had accepted the technology and had seen the positive benefits and increased patient safety.( Coyle & Heinen,2005).  Another study reported with the bar-coding of patient, blood sample tubes, blood bag and 100% efficiency of blood transfusion was achieved and they provided to be efficient double check than manual meters.( Murphy &Kay , 2004) .Another study carried out by El Camino hospital showed that use of barcode in their hospital brought about a decrease in error, increased timeliness, increased patient safety and satisfaction.( Bukunt  etal.,2005) Implications for nursing: Nursing practice is the practice is the main concept in the healthcare field that strongly influences the quality of care and patient safety. As Kirkpatrick stated nurses are duly expected to treat appropriate patient, with appropriate procedure and appropriate dose.. The barcode technology now has come as a revolution to assist nurses in all their duties. The barcode technology is found to help nurses in all spheres of their work starting from identification of patients to entering records, rendering medication, enabling proper sampling, proper blood administration, providing appropriate treatment etc. for example first the nurse scans the barcode of the patient, then enters the information about the drug to be administered, the software verifies whether that is correct drug and flashes the correct dosage and time thus making patient safe against human error of wrong drug administration. Similarly during blood administration also the barcode scanned in patient, test sample and bags highly increases the patient’s safety of obtaining right blood type. It helps nurse to effectively track samples also. Similarly it helps nurses in radiology, scanning, surgery, therapist for correct identification of patients and to effectively match the treatment. (Heinen etal.,2003) Conclusions: Thus it could be better understood that Patient safety through medication safety, has become the buzz word in healthcare technology. With the one of leading cause of hospital based morbidity being medication errors that arises due wrong medication, the calling of Institute of Medicine to increasingly use the information technology to reduce medication errors gains importance. In this scenario the barcode technology has been proven to be an effective tool in bringing out patient safety. References Bukunt S; Hunter C; Perkins S; Russell D; Domanico L,El Camino Hospital: using health information technology to promote patient safety. Jt Comm J Qual Patient Saf.  2005; 31(10):561-5  Coyle GA; Heinen M, Evolution of BCMA within the Department of Veterans Affairs, Nurs Adm Q.  2005; 29(1):32-8 . Heinen, Mary G. RN, MSN; Coyle, Geraldine A. RN, Barcoding makes its mark on daily practice , Journal of Nursing Administration. 33 Supplement:18-20, October 2003. Kohn, L.T., Corrigan, J. M., & Donaldson, M.. (Eds.). (2000). To err is human: Building a safer health system. Washington, DC: National Academy Press. Murphy MF, Kay JDS. Barcode identification for transfusion safety. Current opinion in hematology. 2004 Sep;11(5):334–8 Read More