NHS FPX 4000 Assessment 3
[Student Name]
Capella University
[Prof. Name]
August 2025
NHS FPX 4000 Assessment 3: Analyze Medication Errors
The safety of medicine administration is crucial and seems to be deteriorating. The worldwide journal claims that in the United States alone, drug errors cause about 9,000 deaths annually (Rayhan et al., 2020). To ensure safe drug administration, computerized methods have been created in response to chronic pharmaceutical errors in healthcare organizations. A few of the peer-reviewed articles I consulted for my NHS FPX 4000 assessment 3 study indicate that there is a need for more seasoned nurses. Simulated training and automated techniques were used to test other participants. Reducing drug errors in healthcare and improving patient safety should be top priorities for both patients and medical personnel, as medication safety is still one of the major current healthcare issues.
Elements of Medication Errors
Medication errors can result from a number of factors. The emergence of comparable medications is one of the contributing factors (Rash Foanio, 2017). Thousands of medications have similar spellings or pronunciations. Avoidable errors occur when the provider is overworked and the unit is understaffed. Examples of related medications are cyclosporine and cyclocloserine, which are spelled and pronounced similarly. NHS FPX 4000 assessment 3 will look more closely at this problem and ways to prevent it. Because the names of the prescriptions were similar, this was an easy mistake to make, especially when you are not closely monitoring what you are prescribing. Most medication errors occur prior to the substance being administered. Approximately 50% of medication errors are seen here. One of the persistent universal health care problems is that most of these errors are found by the pharmacist or nurse while looking over the patient’s electronic medical record. Prescription errors are associated with workplace distractions and the patient’s or nurse’s ongoing need for the provider’s attention
(Rayhan et al., 2020). It is frequently necessary to address problems with universal health care and make sure that medical professionals from various specializations work together to lower risks and enhance patient safety.
Additionally, long hours, working night shifts, and fatigue were important contributors to prescription errors (Salar et al., 2020). Problems with United Health Care, such as staffing shortages and resource limitations, can aggravate these issues. Disregarding recognized drug safety recommendations while fatigued and low on energy can easily lead to drug disasters. The medical industry is implementing a number of rules to minimize medication errors, which have been shown to be successful when taken as prescribed. NHS FPX 4000 assessment 3 will examine these contributory variables and preventive strategies in more detail. During the drug verification process, some nurses pay less attention since they are constantly distracted and continue to work longer hours to meet staffing shortages. The nurses and all other staff members should be encouraged to act in a uniform way. It was also recommended that in-service training be regularly conducted and monitored to compel healthcare staff to maintain consistency (Salar and others, 2020).
Analysis
Medication mistakes can be very dangerous and deadly. Such accidents are a result of healthcare problems in the US, including insufficient safety inspections and communication gaps. I saw a nurse give medication to a patient who had an allergy to it because she neglected to look up the patient’s allergies in the patient’s medical file before administering the medication. The patient experienced an allergic reaction as a result of disregarding safety protocols, necessitating the employment of an active counteragent to undo the effects of the medication. Since this incident, I’ve made it a priority to calmly and deliberately mix and deliver
prescriptions, frequently getting another nurse’s approval. The importance of safety procedures is highlighted by this real-world scenario, and they will be thoroughly discussed in the NHS FPX 4000 assessment 3. The extra effort and careful attention to detail can greatly lessen the likelihood of making a pharmacological error that could have catastrophic repercussions. By guaranteeing patient safety through integrated cooperation, putting preventive measures like these into practice can be a crucial part of tackling healthcare problems.
Context for Safety Issues
Health care personnel have been overworked, especially during the outbreak, when there was a severe patient overload and staffing shortfall. Physicians now oversee a greater number of patients than ever before, and the nurse-to-patient ratio has been gradually increasing. The stress of already demanding work is increased for nurses who have to accomplish more charting and chores in less time due to the high patient load. This pressure raises the danger of drug errors in addition to the possibility of poor charting. These difficulties and how they affect patient safety are important topics of discussion in NHS FPX 4000 assessment 3. Sometimes nurses even take many patients’ drugs out of the pyxis to save time, but this puts patient safety at risk. Under such stressful circumstances, addressing health care policy problems might contribute to the development of improved systems that more efficiently allocate tasks and enhance patient safety. A fatal medication error is more likely to happen when you feel like you don’t have enough time to execute your job well, underscoring the role that current healthcare issues play in increasing these risks (Rayhan et al., 2020).
Populations Affected
Medication errors can affect any age group. The chance of having a medication error is not influenced by age. Children are among the groups that are more susceptible to medication
errors than others. Children’s weight-based doses require the application of mathematical calculations. A nurse who is not skilled at solving equations and precisely calculating the dosage could be a serious danger to patient safety because weight-based dosing necessitates a high level of mathematical knowledge. In the United States, weight is measured differently from medication. NHS FPX 4000 assessments 3 will cover the significance of precision in weight-based dosing and its function in avoiding pediatric medication mistakes.
In the pediatric context, this pound needs to be translated to kilograms in order to calculate the dosage appropriately. Most errors involving young patients are due to incorrect math calculations, which are particularly common with liquid medications. A little medication error in a child could have more severe or lethal side effects than it would for a patient in the general population. Because they are frequently taking multiple drugs and have a history of medical issues, the elderly are among the groups most affected by drug-related incidents. Further discussion of these age groups’ increased susceptibility and risk-reduction techniques will be covered in NHS FPX 4000 assessment 3. Therefore, if medical personnel are not closely monitoring their patients, they can prescribe a medicine that interferes with their current prescription regimen. Perez-Jover et al. (2018) claim that older people are the least knowledgeable about the precautions that need to be taken when taking their drugs. They may not even be aware of the interactions between medications or how often to take them. In order to coordinate medication safety across healthcare professionals, it is crucial to address universal healthcare problems, as some elderly people end up taking their prescription medications more frequently than is advised.
Considering Options
By using safety procedures and guidelines consistently, most pharmaceutical errors can be avoided. Posting signs identifying the medicine room as a quiet area is one practical strategy. This lessens the possibility of choosing the incorrect drug for a patient and helps prevent distractions (Rayhan et al., 2020). NHS FPX 4000 assessment 3 places a lot of emphasis on how these distraction-reduction techniques can help to promote medication safety. The nurses’ next step is to verify the medication they are obtaining by looking through the patient’s electronic record. The nurse should match the medication to the patient’s allergies after confirming the medication with the EMR. Lastly, before giving the patient their medication, the nurse should scan their armband. The substance will be flagged or confirmed by the computerized system as a result. Enhancing patient safety, this will help address some problems with universal health care by alerting the nurse to a discrepancy and possibly averting a drug mishap.
Solution
The main technique that hospitals have implemented is scanning the barcode after first scanning the patient’s armband. This strategy, when used correctly, has saved many people from being prescribed the wrong medication. This solution will require a barcode scanner and PCs in every location for easy system access. This system’s ability to stop the nurse from giving medication until the patient’s medication and dosage have been accurately scanned is one of its benefits. Another benefit is that patients can participate in the drug exchange and ask questions about any prescription that doesn’t seem or sound familiar. The long time needed to complete everything precisely and the fact that certain systems are configured to allow medical professionals to disregard the warnings are two of this system’s shortcomings. If the nurse is not actually doing the medication administration checks, a drug could be supplied by overriding the system.
In order to further reduce pharmaceutical errors, nurses, pharmacists, and other healthcare workers can work together more effectively if problems with the united healthcare are addressed.
Ethical Implications
The moral implications of putting computers in patients’ rooms are part of medication errors since they support justice, autonomy, and the truth. Prior to the time for administration, the patient will be informed of what they are taking by the nurse reading the drug to them. It would also be the patient’s right to know if the nurse gave them the incorrect medication.
A patient has the right to know what happened, even if there was no harm, according to the Bill of Rights. Because they can manage their own health care programs, the patient will become more independent. The patient would be receiving justice if they were given the same treatment as all other hospital patients and were given the assurance that the right steps had been taken for their care. Benefits include heightened patient awareness of their treatment and involvement in their care. By addressing health care problems in the US at this point, it is possible to improve understanding and confidence by coordinating communication about possible errors among all members of the care team. The disadvantages of this include the possibility that some patients may not completely comprehend the consequences of their decisions and may base their decisions on mistrust and anxiety in the event that a pharmaceutical error does occur. Providing patients with all the information they might possibly require to make informed decisions on their treatment plan is a moral obligation. In order to assist this process, every healthcare facility should establish a comprehensive policy regarding the disclosure of pharmaceutical errors.
Implementing the Solutions
Safety will be ensured by taking extra precautions, even though doing so may require nurses to spend a longer time giving medicine passes. Requiring a nurse to scan each patient’s wristband and all drugs can help prevent medication errors. An additional degree of security can be added by placing a computer with a barcode scanner or portable computer configurations in each patient’s room. This strategy is in line with initiatives to solve healthcare problems and guarantees that several members of the healthcare team will help to improve pharmaceutical safety. The nurse scans the medication after scanning the patient’s armband. The computerized system will then receive the data and either approve the delivery of the drug or sound a warning. When administering medication to different people, this will be very beneficial (Rayhan et al., 2020). Upon hearing the alarm, the nurse should verify that these medications are the correct ones and that the dosage is accurate. Additionally, a computer with access to the medication records ought to be present in the medication room in case the patient’s room’s electronic system fails. If the matter is entirely ignored, the patient might not survive, and the nurse might be reprimanded for not doing all medication administration checks.
Conclusion
Problems about the safety of pharmaceuticals in hospitals and other healthcare institutions are numerous, underscoring persistent issues with health care policy. Every year, medication errors result in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of hospitalized patients (Rayhan et al., 2020). Implementing extra verification procedures, including scanning the patient’s armbands or the medication’s barcode in the medication room, will increase safety. Establishing peaceful spaces in medicine rooms has the dual benefits of lowering prescription errors and enhancing patient safety. According to NHS FPX 4000 assessment 3, any action or solution will help to reduce pharmaceutical errors.
References
Pérez-Jover, V., Mira, J. J., Carratala-Munuera, C., Gil-Guillen, V. F., Basora, J., López-Pineda, A., & Orozco-Beltrán, D. (2018, February 10). Inappropriate use of medication by elderly, Poly medicated, or multipath logical patients with chronic diseases. International journal of environmental research and public health. Retrieved June 8, 2022, from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5858379/
Rash-Foanio, C., Galanter, W., Bryson, M., Falck, S., Liu, K. L., Schiff, G. D., Vaida, A., & Lambert, B. L. (2017). Automated detection of alike medication. American Journal. https://doi.org/10.2146/ajhp150690
Rayhan, Tariq. A., Rishik, V., Ankur, S., & Yevgeniya, S. (2020, November). Medication dispensing errors and prevention – NCBI bookshelf. Medication Dispensing Errors and Prevention. Retrieved June 7, 2022, from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK519065/
Salar, A., Kiani, F., & Rezaee, N. (2020). Preventing the medication errors in hospitals: A qualitative study. International Journal of Africa Nursing Sciences, 13, 100235. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijans.2020.100235
