Nursing Experience: Reflections on Medication Safety and Clinical Handover

Running head: NURSING EXPERIENCE
Nursing Experience
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

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NURSING EXPERIENCE
Reflection 1:
One clinical nursing experience of mine which is relevant to the standards of National
Safety and Quality Health Service Standards (NSQHS) (2012) is medication safety.
According to Australian Commission on Safety and Quality in Health Care (2012), medicines
are widely accepted of treatment in healthcare. However, medicines are related to with
massive medical errors and this error is associated with increase in the adverse health
outcomes of the patients along with the increase in the overall healthcare cost.
During my clinical placement in the emergency department, I encountered an event of
medication error. The patient was suffering from high fever. I was a trainee nurse and I was
asked to go for a round in the emergency ward to check the health status of the patients.
While on the round, I spotted that one patient who was admitted with leg ulcer was suffering
from high level with temperature 39 degree Centigrade. Recording the condition, I
immediately notified my reporting registered nurse that patient (patient A) is having high
fever I think he immediately needs a dosage of paracetamol. When my registered nurses
asked me what is the dosage I think is preferable for him, I immediately replied high
paracetamol dosage for immediate relief from the fever, which is arising from inflammation
or wound infection due to leg ulcer. However, my registered nurse highlighted that high
dosage of paracetamol is detrimental for Patient A as he is also a patient for liver cirrhosis.
According to Imani et al. (2014) paracetamol is safe for the patients with severe liver disease
but a lower dosage of paracetamol (2gm/day) is suggested for the long-term use. My
registered nurse under whom I was working also helped me to understand that before
prescribing any medication to the patient; it is the duty of the nursing professional to consult

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NURSING EXPERIENCE
with the reporting doctor while accessing the patient medication history in detail. This helped
to reduce the chances of medication error.
This clinical experience helped to understand the importance of the maintaining a
detailed medicine history of the patient and at the same time saved me from conducting a
medication error. The NSQHS highlighted that it is the duty of the clinical workforce to
document and review patient’s medication history. This helps to avoid the episodes of
medication error and adverse health outcomes. In order to increase the access of the patient’s
medication history, Radley et al. (2013) highlighted that importance of the computerized
physician’s order entry system (CPOE) and proper documentation of the patient information
in the electronic medical records (EMR).
Reflection 2:
One clinical nursing experience of mine relevant to the national safety and quality
service standard is the clinical handover. Clinical safety handover refers to the procedure
where professional responsibility of one person in all aspects for the patient transfer to
another person or professional group on a temporary (Anderson et al., 2015). It is an essential
part has impact on the health care centers.
When I was posted to the cardiac department of the royal hospital of Australia, I
encountered such clinical error due to the improper way of clinical handover. My fellow
coworker’s shift was about to end. She was taking care of a 52 years female patient who was
diagnosed with Congestive pulmonary heart failure. Approximately, 1 to 2 hours after shift
time she came to me and told me about the patient and severity level of the disease. She