The medication administration error

Running head: MEDICATION ADMINISTRATION ERROR
MEDICATION ADMINISTRATION ERROR
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MEDICATION ADMINISTRATION ERROR
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Introduction
In the current health care system, there are many cases of a medication error, which lack
a relevant and right amount of data. It is important to fetch the details about the medication
administration error, so that critical step can be taken to ensure patient safety and implement new
ways in the health care system to promote medication safety. Therefore, the main aim of the
paper is to critically investigate the evidence available about the medication administration error
from three different sources, which is related to the primary research; a professional guideline,
standards and policy; and health care data.
Medication administration error
The medication error is one of the most common mistake in the field of the health care
system, which can occur during ordering, dispensing, transcription and administration. The
medication administration error is among the most common which can take place due to a
discrepancy in taking the drug by the patient and given by the prescriber.it can occur when a
nurse fails in maintaining the five right which includes right dose, patient, route, medication and
time. Such error can also take place due to the understaffing, poor equipment design and process
and individual level mistakes and lapses (Keers et al. 2015). It is the primary safety problem,
which can pose negative impact on the health of the patient in term of morbidity and mortality,
long stay in hospital and re-admissions in the hospital. The drug administration process is the
daily work and responsibility of the nursing practice. They need to recognize and respond to such
error y clarifying the unclear orders and interrogating orders that seem not to be appropriate
(Elliott et al. 2018).

MEDICATION ADMINISTRATION ERROR
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Critical analysis of the issue through primary research:
The study of Berdot et al. (2016) focused on the medication administration error, where
the author has done a systematic review and included ten studies from a different database. The
study was mainly randomized control trial and analyzed the cause of drug administration error.
The author in his studies concluded that Medication administration error arises due to the
unconscious of nurse activity, and the potential reason is single checking of the drug before
administration. The author suggested that double-checking should be encouraged as a healthy
practice to avoid any harm to the patient. In the review of direct observation studies by Cottne
and Innes (2015) the researcher has estimated that error rate in drug administration is 8% to 25%
in which intravenous administration accounts for the 57%. The primary reason identified is the
wrong dose, frequency, and preparation of intravenous drugs. The study by Lamerton et al.
(2017), which aims to do, randomized controlled trial on the current issue of medication
administration error. The author has included studies from two hospitals and examined the error
rate and its impact. The author has done the direct observation of record the error rate and the
principal cause. As a result, the author found that the area where the medication administration
error occurs is related to its way of preparation, infusion rate additionally author also found that
nurse are disinclined to report to the error which has contributed to its high rate in the health
sector. The primary reason identified is fear of penalizing action, lack of security of reported
error, damage to reputation to hospital and lack of assertiveness among the nurse. Such
characteristic of the nurses has led to worsening the health of the outcome of the patient and the
error rate has increased to 34% from 20%.
From the study of Härkänen et al. (2016) based on direct observation and RCT, another
significant source of administration error was found to be patient and caregiver, as they are