You've encountered medication errors in your nursing practice. How can you prevent them in the future?

In some high risk drugs, like potassium, nurses should double check the amount of drug and the way of infusion. I think, if we wanna gain a higher speed in this scenario we should use AI as a visitor to our administration process.

We can never go wrong with double checking medications and it’s orders and ensuring that we’re dispensing the right drug to the right patient. To avoid drug errors, Nurses have to strictly go through the rights of drug administration and double checking at every given opportunity.

During nursing school, we are taught very early the importance of verifying medications before giving them to patients because of the harm they can do. Medication errors contribute to monetary and physical damage to patients and can be significantly reduced by taking the time to verify your orders for the medication you are withdrawing from the pyxis; in addition, another layer of safety can be checking the medicines in the room before administering the drug. Verifying the 5 rights are safety nets that help us practice safe nursing and protect our patients, so remember the fundamentals in your practice.

It is important that we ensure the validity of every prescription and medication order. If it is not legible or there are any discrepancies, we need to seek for clarification in order to maintain patient safety as this is our responsibility as Nurses.

In practice, nurses learn that treatment plans can be consistent with specific diagnoses; therefore, if you ever encounter a treatment medication written at a higher dose or perhaps a different drug than standard, do not be afraid to use your resources, like a charger nurse, or even clarify the order with the ordering physician to ensure that it is correct. Communication can and will help prevent medication errors.

I love how technology can improve a health system and nursing practice. With the ease of using resources found within the electronic health record like a patient's MAR, you can often find a resource tab that will give you common information about their drugs, including allergies, contraindications, onset and peak times, and other data to help reduce medication errors. Technology can be a great tool if used properly.

Simply put, every nurse has made a medication error, and the best approach to recognizing and fixing this common occurrence is to be transparent and help our new nurses. I have made a "medication" error in the past but have been very transparent with new nurses to help ensure they understand the severity yet want them to know it happens. Still, we need to be more vigilant and aware of the importance of double-checking medications before giving them.

If you are working in a team setting then pull your clients team together. As a former case manager I have seen when a nurse finds a medication error and the power of reaching out to the case manager and pulling together a fix.