Nurses' Experiences and Perspectives on Medication Safety Practices

Guided questions Answer Template (Please do not Remove the questions)
Guided Question Qualitative Study Quantitative Study
1. Aim and Significance
(5 marks 200 words)
a. What was the aim and
significance of the study?
The study by Smeulers et al., (2014),
assesses the nursing core issue of medication
errors. Medication errors are of significance in
the medical profession since it is associated
with significant costs on medical expenses. The
rise of medication errors tends to cause harm to
patients. Due to the high number of medication
errors, there have been increasing medication
safety practices. The study perspectives and
experiences of nurses are being investigated in
regard to patient safety practice. Knowledge on
the mediation safety practices is of the essence
in assessing the barriers and facilitators of its
implementation, thus the aim of the study
aimed at learning more about nurses experience
and perspectives on prevention of medication
administration errors.
The study by Sahay, Hutchinson & East (2015) focuses on
medication errors in the nursing profession. Medication errors
play a significant role in patient safety and health outcomes. It
has a negative impact on patient health care quality. In this
perspective, the role of nurses is fundamental in ensuring that
medical errors are minimized. In this view, graduate nurses are
often predisposed to such errors due to limited familiarity with
the working environment of the profession. This study aimed at
exploring self-reported medication errors and the establishment of
whether workplace environment support and relationships are
linked to medication errors or safe care practices in medication
practice.

2. Methods (10 marks
700 words)
a. Identify the
research design used
in the study and was
it appropriate for the
issue discussed?
Qualitative study
The study has adopted qualitative
explorative research design to collect the
perceptions and views of the nurses with
regards to the implementation of medical
administration practices guidelines. The
qualitative explorative design is essential in
gaining a deep understanding of the overall
reasoning and opinion and provides insights
into the special problem. It is further essential
for uncovering trends and through or opinions
and give a deep sense into the problem. The
design is typically characterized by the small
and lean respondent numbers in order to fulfill
the given quota. The study aims are to assess
the perceptions of the nurses and the best way
to adopt this is by use of a qualitative
explorative design which will asses thematic
views of the respondents and offers
The descriptive research design is essential in describing the
characterizing of the population of the phenomenon being
studied. Descriptive studies are more concerned with questions
relating to finding out ‘what is' which is being investigated in a
study. The underlying characteristics are essential in describing
the overall situation of the population which are descriptively
defined. This designed has low internal validity content thus not
applicable for establishing a causal relationship. The study fits
into the typical characteristics of descriptive design thus offering
the suitable design to be used in the study. It focuses on what
question making it the right design to be explored for this study.

consolidation of common thematic topics.
b. Discuss the sampling
technique, inclusion and
exclusion criteria used for
the selection of sample in
the study
The study used purposive sampling which
was geared at obtaining a high level of
heterogeneity. Purposive sampling is a
nonprobability method of sampling which is
based on the population characteristics and the
underlying objectives of the study. The method
is essential in reaching the target population
quickly and where the issue of proportionality
is not of concern. Heterogeneous nature
adopted is crucial in providing a wide range of
cases which are particularly relevant to
particular phenomena or event. It provides
much in-depth insight into a phenomenon.
Further snowballing was used to obtained
other participants who were from another
department so as to reach the target participants
number. Snow baling in qualitative research
entails the action of the other participants
recruiting other participants into the study. This
is beneficial when it is hard for the location of
The study used recruited respondents from the university
nursing student’s database of Australian University. The database
contained a total of 1425 nursing graduates. The study estimated
that 30% of the respondents still have active emails, based on this
a total of 427 possible respondents were obtained. The study
included the preview recent nursing students and those who were
able to still retain the emails accounts used in school. Online
surveys report a low response rate of about 20%-40% based on
the study justification, thus the recruitment process expected a
minimum threshold of 50 respondents. Those who did not
respond to emails invitation were automatically excluded from
the research.