Medication Errors In Health Care

Medication Errors in Healthcare A medication error is defined as an event that can be prevented that may cause or lead to harm occurring in a patient (FDA, 2009). These errors are a more common thing than one would think. In the United States alone, it is estimated that approximately 1.5 million patients every year have harm due to a medication error (Agrawal, 2009). Because of this, prevention of medication errors has become of increasingly high importance. Medication errors are costly, not only to the healthcare facilities, but also the patients and families as well. For this reason, it has become of great importance for healthcare facilities to prevent these errors. It is estimated that approximately $3.5 billion is spent on drug related injuries occurring in hospitals alone (MedLaw, 2006). This price includes not only the cost of treatment after the fact, but also the cos t of the incorrect medication used for administration. Regarding the costliness to patients and their families, patient injury or death may occur as a result of a medication error. This may be due to an incorrect drug or perhaps an incorrect dose being administered. The possibility of the patient having an allergy to this incorrect drug administration could also further cause damage as well. When passing medications, ensuring safety and quality in the administration

Medication errors occur during prescription, medication delivery, or during administration. This final step, administration, causes the most errors but is the least well studied category in all of the steps. The only ways to detect these errors are by spontaneous reporting, direct observation, or a review of the patient’s chart (Berdot, 2016). Studies and estimates of cases used for statistical purposes are only those who have been detected, and therefore rates could be even greater than