Qualitative and Quantitative Study on Nurses' Perspectives on Medication Errors

This study examines the perspectives of nurses on medication errors through a qualitative and quantitative approach. It aims to understand the significance of the study and explores the methods used for data collection and analysis. The results highlight the findings of the study and discuss the limitations and recommendations for future research.

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?
1. The main of this study by Smullers
et al. (2014) is to examine the
perspective and experiences of the
nurses regarding the prevention of
medication errors by the nurses. The
significance of this study is
associated with safety of the
patients. In various studies, it was
reported that, due to the medication
errors by the nurses can hamper the
safety of the patients. According to
1. The study of Sahay, Hutchinson and East
(2015), investigated the influence of
workplace supports and relationships on the
safe medication process in the hospital
setting. It is observed that, although the work
place awareness is increasing in the health
care settings of the worlds, the unsupportive
and disruptive behaviour in the work places
are still exist. The main of this study is to
examine the relation among the work place
support, relationships and the safety

the study of Lan et al. (2014), lack of
adequate knowledge about the
medications is responsible for the
errors by the nurses.
medication practice among the newly
graduate nurses. Moreover, a good
relationship and supportive behaviour to the
nurses will help the new nurses to reduce
their errors regarding medications and the
safety of the patients will be enhanced. In
various studies in the world, it is patients face
harms due to the medication errors (Wittich
et al., 2014).
2. Methods (10 marks
700 words)
a. Identify the
research design used
in the study and was
it appropriate for the
1. In this study, a qualitative research
design along with interview method
was used. The research tries to
explore the nurses’ experiences
2. In this study, a descriptive quantitative stage
of a larger sequential mixed methods is
used. A survey based descriptive and
exploratory research design was used. This

issue discussed? regarding the medication errors. So
it is quite evident that, an interview
technique will be more suitable than
any other technique .The study of
Jamshed (2014) also reported the
importance of interview technique in
a qualitative study. So, it can be said
that, this research design is
appropriate for this study.
study method helped the researchers to
refine more number of new measures and
simultaneously help to create operational
and conceptual understandings related to the
safety issues in the health care settings. In
order to develop the survey instrument
initially a search program was conducted in
five electronic databases (Medline,
Cochrane, Proquest, CINAHL and Pub med).
According to the study of Al- Abri and Al-
Balushi (2014), it is reported that, in order to
collect information from a health care sector,
the use of survey method, is very crucial as
this method is essential for identifying gaps
and essential sources of information.
Therefore it can be said that, the use of this

research method in this study is completely
accurate.
b. Discuss the sampling
technique, inclusion and
exclusion criteria used for
the selection of sample in
the study
A snowball sampling technique was
used to take the names of nurses
from other departments so that
different levels of seniority and
knowledge of nurses can be
included in that study. This method
allowed the researchers to gain
knowledge about the knowledge of
different department nurses. As an
inclusion criteria of this study, the
author proposed that, all the
participants should be registered
In this study by Sahay, Hutchinson and East
(2015), a convenience sampling technique
was used. This sampling method allow the
researchers to take anyone he or she finds.
The samples are selected as per the
convenience of the researchers. This
sampling technique has a few advantages
such as saving of time, money, more
availability of data. Such advantages can be
gained as the sample are selected and the
as a result, the researcher can save time.
Due to such kind of sampling technique,

nurses in order to participate in the
study.
there are chances of bias in gathering the
data, chances of sampling errors (Peterson,
& Merunka, 2014). The three participating
nursing colleges had almost 1425 recent
nursing graduates and among them 427
have the possibility of giving responses
thorough the online surveys. Almost 58
nurses responded to the online surveys. No
exclusion criteria was mentioned in this
study.
c.Explore the data
collection method and its
appropriateness to the
research design of the
study
A semi-structured interview method
was used to collect the data
conducted by the between March and
December, 2011. In this interview
method, almost 20 nurses
For collecting the data, the survey links were
mailed to the graduate students of
universities by the administrative staff of the
each universities. For improving the
response rate from the students, daily email

participated. Each of the interview
process lasted for 60-90 minutes.
The use of semi-structured interview
allowed the participants to raise their
issues .The study of Teijlinjen
(2014), reported that, the use of
semi-structured interview method
helps to explore the people’s
behaviour, opinion regarding any
context and a semi structured
interview also help to capture the
methods in which people interprets
experiences, events So, a semi-
structured interview used in this study
method is appropriate as it will
explore the nurses’ behaviour in well
reminders were also sent to the participants
for three consecutive fortnights by the
administrative staff .The survey method is
quite appropriate with this study design as in
various studies, this survey method is used
as part of this quantitative research (Sahay,
Hutchinson & East, 2015)
.

manner.
3. Data analysis and
results (10 marks
600 words)
a.How was the data
analysed and was it
appropriate for the study?
After collecting the data from the interview
process, the data was entered into the
MAXQDA10 software. The interview
participants were coded differently and
codes were discussed and compared until
reaching to a consensus coding tree. For
the first 15 participants, coding and
consensus meetings were executed
iteratively. For the other 5 participants, the
interviews were divided with an author code
and 4 author review code. By using the
For analysing the data, at first the survey
data was downloaded from the e Qualtrics®
online platform that was presented on the
websites of the relevant Universities. After
that, those data were analysed by using the
Statistic Package for Social Sciences (SPSS)
version 20. The descriptive statistics were
tracked on the complete data set in order to
find the extent of missing data and logical
responses. Then, the frequency distribution
along with mean and standard deviations,

consensus meetings, the experiences and
perspective of the nurses were identified on
preventing MAE by the nurses. After this
process, the text fragments were identified
and examined as per the identified themes.
After that process, the other co-authors
supported the process and the results. The
study by Li et al. (2015), also reported the
use of this data analysis method in their
study. In another study by Faraji et al.
(2015), also supported this data analysis
and they also used this data analysis
method in their study on prevention policy
and programs of diabetes in Iran.
and Spearman's correlation were performed
(Sahay, Hutchinson & East, 2015)
b.What were the
findings/results of the
In the study by Smeulers et al.
(2014), 20 nurses were approached
The study results showed that, the almost 58.6% of the
total sample population had the issues of medication

study? to participate in the study and all of
the participants participated
voluntarily in this research study.
Among the 20 nurses, 15 nurses
were females and 5 were male. The
nurses had the mean age of 43
years ranging from 27-61. In the
total subjects population, 2 nurses
represented nurse directors (n=2), 3
nurses represented the nursing ward
manager (n=3), 2 nurses
represented the nurse quality
innovators (n= 2), 5 nurses were
senior nurses in the population
group (n= 5) and 5 nurses
represented the regular nurses (n=8)
errors. The surgical units of the hospitals had the
highest rates of medication errors. Almost 60.3% of
population had reported about observing medication
errors (n=35). On the other hand, 24.1% (n = 14)
reported that they had not witnessed any case of
medication errors. After performing the spearman’s
correlation it was found that, various supportive factors
had positive effect on the graduate nurses’ medication
practices. These includes the relationship between the
NUM relationships and erosion of graduate safe-
medication practice (r = −0.46, p b 0.001), education
and learning support and erosions of graduate safe-
medication practice (r = −0.34, p b 0.001) and
supportive work team behaviours and erosions of
graduate safe-medication practice (r = −0.51, p b
0.001).

(Smeulers et al., 2014). The authors
reported that, the nurses had a
pivotal role in safety process
regarding the administration of the
medicines and in addition to this,
they are also associated with the
preparation of medicines prescribed
by the doctors. The authors found
that, teamwork is required in order to
maintain a safe hospital
environment. A safe hospital
environment can also help the
nurses to avoid the errors in the
medication process and the nurses
should have adequate knowledge in
order to avoid such medication

errors. The use of safe medication
rooms and creation of more
awareness is required for safe
medication administration (Smeulers
et al., 2014).
c.Discuss the limitations
and recommendations of
the study?
As a part of the limitations of this study it
can be said that the sample size was too
small for this study. In addition to this, the
use of single-centre tree in the data
analysis process can be marked as another
limitation of this study. So it can be
recommended that, the future research on
this field should focus on the executive
roles of the nurses and the nurse managers
in managing safety issues. Along with this,
In this study, the recent graduates are only counted as
the subject population of this study and it can be
marked as a limitation of this study. E-mail id’s of the
students are used to collect the data and it is also
another drawbacks of the study. It is recommended
that, in future all those drawbacks should be limited
from the future study.

it is recommended that, the nurses should
have knowledge about the safety.

References
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