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On the Frontlines of Patient Safety
Tracy Thomsic
McKesson
Safety is always a hot topic in every aspect of life, and the health care industry is no exception. Patient safety is a major concern, for both the patients and the medical staff who administer care.
In 1999, the Institute for Healthcare Improvements reported an estimated 98,000 patients die each year from medical errors, and of these 7,000 are specifically from medication errors.
Frontline nurses, the registered nurses who deliver bedside care, play a vital role in maintaining patient safety and optimal levels of care in a hospital. These aptly named staff members are at the front lines of medication safety. While doctors diagnose and prescribed treatment, it is most often the nurses who carry out these treatments.
In 2005, leading health care IT provider McKesson dove further in to the issue of patient safety from a nurse's perspective. McKesson commissioned the Harris Institute to conduct a study of 216 frontline nurses in order to gauge their perceptions of the current state of patient safety.
The study results produced several interesting conclusions about the level of patient safety in 's hospitals. On the whole, frontline nurses reported that patient safety has improved over the past five years. Reasons for this improvement include technology, which has helped to reduce medication errors, and better communication between medical professionals.
However, medication safety is still a major concern for hospital personnel. The vast majority of respondents had first-hand accounts of at least one major medication error over the past five years. Though patient safety is improving, medication errors still have plenty of opportunities to occur during times when nurses are unfamiliar with a given medication, or when patients are being transferred to different units or different personnel for care.
Most nurses reported that technology could further reduce medication errors that effect patient safety. With the adoption of electronic health records (EHR), nurses can devote more attention to caring for patients and less to time-consuming documentation. Such technology programs can also improve access to information and therefore communication between hospital personnel, and deliver automatic notification of critical information.
Though these improvements can further reduce errors and increase patient safety, nurses feel the biggest barrier to improved patient safety is the nursing shortage. With a greater staff to patient ratio, patients receive the time and attention required to deliver the optimum level of care they need. Overall, the Harris Study highlights the continued importance of striving for greater patient safety through multiple fronts.
Article submitted Tuesday, September 23, 2008
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