The Views of Nurses Working in Surgical Clinics and Surgical Intensive Care Units on Medication Administration Errors and Error Reporting

Abstract

Aim: This study aims to identify the causes of medication administration errors and the reasons stated by nurses working in surgical clinics and surgical intensive care units for not reporting these errors, and to compare the number of errors nurses witness and the number of errors actually reported.
 Method: The research sample of this descriptive cross-sectional study consists of 125 nurses working in surgical clinics and surgical intensive care units. Data were collected using the face-to-face survey method. The Nurse Personal Information Form and the Medication Administration Error Scale were used to collect data.
 Results: The perceived medication administration error rate was found to be 59%; however, 61.6% of the nurses reported that only 0-20% of medication administration errors were actually reported. The main reasons for not reporting medication errors are administrative response (4.10±1.18) and fear (3.28±0.99). The most important reason for not reporting errors due to the administrative response is that no positive feedback is given after correct medication administration (4.18±1.53). The perceived cause of medication administration error is pharmacy-related and system-related, which explains 26% of the reason for not reporting the error due to fear. The fact that the reason for medication administration error originates from the physician, pharmacy and system explains 51% of the reason for not reporting the error due to disagreement over the error.
 Conclusion: There is a major difference between the medication administration errors nurses witness and the errors they actually report. The errors are not reported due to administrative response and fear.