We Hate Med Errors, Yes We Do! We Hate Med Errors, So Should You!

Knock, knock. Whose there? Interrupting patient. Interrupting patient wh--? "Um, this pill is supposed to be red, not blue." Did you know that preventable medication errors cause 1 death per day & 1.3 million injuries per year (Kalisch & Aebersold, 2010)? Yeah, most nurses don't so we're here to give you some tips on how to prevent this.

Dwight perfectly describes how we feel when interruptions occur during medication administration.

giphy.com / Via giphy.com

Interruptions have become an accepted part of nursing practice. And guess what, no matter how much experience you have in the field, all nurses are susceptible to making the same amount of medication errors (Stetina, Groves, Pafford, 2005). Not to mention that they also increase hospital costs and put healthcare professional's jobs at risk. NOBODY wants to pay more money for something if they don't have to OR get fired from there job, so keep reading.

Imagine if your nurse had a coworker like Corinne on Nick's season of the Bachelor. YIKES!

Giphy / Via giphy.com

If you're the one in the hospital bed receiving medication, you definitely do not want your nurse to be interrupted while preparing it. We've got bad news...nurses are interrupted 10 times per hour and 47% of the interruptions occur during medication preparation and administration (Kalisch & Abersold, 2010).

Solution 1: Nurses wear vests while preparing medications. But let's be real, you would probably cry like Kim K if caught dead in one of these fashion backward hospital trends.

giphy.com / Via giphy.com

Nurses can wear a vest to alert others that they are administering medications and that they are not to be interrupted--besides in emergencies, of course! We hope that the vest will prevent distractions before they start (Flynn, 2016). Or maybe it will just be so hideous that everyone will be too embarrassed to associate themselves with the nurse. Either way, its a winning situation...

Solution 2: 6 Rights of Medication Administration Checklist. [Please don't just check them off on your hands like these ladies though--that won't cut it]

giphy.com / Via giphy.com

The 6 rights [right patient, right medication, right time, right dose, right route, and right documentation] are pounded into a nursing students head in school these days. They're like a medication administration bible or survival guide. In our opinion, you're just trying to defy authority if you don't use them. USE THEM! By creating a checklist on the computer and in the patients room, nurses can check off the rights one by one and ensure they are NOT making an error (Stetina, Groves, & Pafford, 2005). We suggest you check the 6 rights AT LEAST twice. You're welcome.

Solution 3: Phones and pagers are for emergencies only during medication administration.

giphy.com / Via giphy.com

Think about all of the times your parents have gotten really mad at you because they're trying to hold a conversation with you but you just keep looking at your phone. They ask you to repeat what they just said but you have no idea because you're so enthralled by the hilarious meme your BFF just tagged you in. This same thing happens when nurses are interrupted by their pagers and phones during medication preparation and administration. A page comes through, they read it, then BAM, they don't know where they left off. Because nurses are paged and called very frequently during med pass, we want to implement a protocol that directs pages and calls to other hospital personnel at this time. Only call them, beep them, if you wanna reach them if they're NOT administering meds!

Like Coach Carr teaches sex-ed, we must teach our patients!

giphy.com / Via giphy.com

Nurses must educate their patients and patients' families on the importance of medication administration and how detrimental it can be if the nurse is distracted. If we teach everyone coming into the hospital not to interrupt the nurses when they are passing medications, they will be less distracted and make fewer errors... and patients won't die!

Kip loves technology and so do we!

giphy.com / Via giphy.com

Technology has become a blessing in the realm of medicine, among many other fields. I mean, who doesn't love a computer making their work ten times easier? We know that nurses do!

But...technology fails!

giphy.com / Via giphy.com

While technology is definitely there to help, (Omnicell, MAR, electronic barcoding systems) its possible to rely on it too much. We can't tell you how many times we've reached into an Omnicell drawer and pulled out a med that does not belong there.

Just shut up...

giphy.com / Via giphy.com

Next time you're administering medications, take Snape's advice. By wearing vests, following the six rights of medication administration, and refraining from pager/phone use, you can reduce your risk of committing a medication error. For all you know, you could be saving a life.