Analyzing a current health care problem or issues

Medication errors are indeed a healthcare problem. You are using scholarly information to describe some of the common contributing factors resulting in medication errors and how it presents a health care problem or issue. You have adequately described several groups who are at a greater risk of experiencing medication errors. Recruiting additional nurses would aid in staffing shortage but not availability. Let us look at this a little further. What is the ideal RN to patient ratio for specific healthcare settings? How do you propose nursing programs attract potential students? What aspects of nursing education may be amended to better prepare nursing students to administer medications? What technologies are available to aid in medication administration? These technologies would likely aid nurses who are experiencing fatigue. Finally, once you have identified several contributing factors and potential solutions then you must analyze how the proposed solutions support or refute the ethical principles of public health? Remember to define the principles.

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Okay, let us work together on this one. Once you have identified several contributing factors and potential solutions then you must analyze how the proposed solutions support or refute the ethical principles of public health? Remember to define the principles. (Non-Performance).

Below is my writing.

Current healthcare problem

Introduction

In these modern times, the healthcare system faces numerous challenges requiring preparations from the professional. The health sector’s complexity is evolving, gradually bringing changes across different contexts of health care levels. However, in some cases, there is an inadequacy of the capacity to handle emerging healthcare problems. This paper aims to interrogate the healthcare problem of medication errors, the affected systems, and potential solutions to demonstrate proficiency in competencies required in the course.  patient safety and are one of the most common, and in most cases, leading to fatalities. These errors occur due to inappropriately using drugs in patients, mostly resulting from drugs’ wrong prescription. Some of the most common medication errors include the wrong time of administering drugs, improper administration technique, wrong dosage, administration of drugs to the wrong patient, and administration of unrequired additional doses (Izadpanah et al., 2018). Being one of the most crucial and intricate aspects of nursing care, giving drugs requires the right knowledge and expertise as medication errors attract adverse and undesirable effects on the victims such as prolonged hospitalization, increased healthcare costs, disability, and injuries, and in extreme cases death occurs (Gorgich et al., 2016). Implementing medication orders is a fundamental component of the treatment process and is a core component of nursing practice (Gorgich et al., 2016). Commonly known as pharmacotherapy, the risks involved in patient care are diverse and require careful intervention when dealing with patients. Analyzing a current health care problem or issues

Analysis Medication errors are preventable events that lead to inappropriate use of medications and cause harm patients while under the supervision of healthcare professionals or consumers. Patient safety and health are one of the most fundamental concepts in healthcare. Correct medications are core in ensuring patient safety as medication errors have undesirable consequences to patients’ health and safety and profound ethical and legal implications to healthcare professionals. According to a study by Izadpanah et al. (2018), medication errors in the hospital were found to be caused mostly by illegibility of doctors’ orders, increased workload with a shortage of human resources, incomplete medication orders, lookalike and soundalike drugs, lack of pharmaceutical experts available in the wards, lack of dosage forms required for paediatrics and incompetencies in pharmacotherapy. The errors are not isolated to specific specialities but cut across the entire disciplines. Majority of medication errors tend to occur in intensive care units where patients cannot express themselves, leading to the omission of crucial information from the patients. It is also not uncommon for these errors to occur in children and neonates under the different medication and in geriatrics where the confusion arises from multiple prescriptions. It is estimated that approximately 12% of hospitalized patients face medical errors, totalling roughly 44000 – 98000 deaths, among which 7000 were attributed to medication errors (Izadpanah et al., 2018; Gorgich et al., 2016). These errors are of economic interest as they are estimated to incur costs estimated at 6.1-6.5 billion dollars. Medication errors are mostly attributable to the nurses and student nurses directly involved with medication administration. In their study, Gorgich et al. (2016) noted that increased workload leading to tiredness resulted in increased tiredness, which eventually led to 97.8% of medication errors, while mistakes in drug calculation by nursing students contributed to 77.4% of medication errors. The magnitude of this problem is alarming and requires joint efforts to formulate possible solutions. Considering options Various studies conducted across the world have yielded various recommendations to curb the menace of medication errors. Gaffney et al. (2016) suggested that nurses fully utilize their education and expertise to identify and correct medication errors and other medical errors to reduce patient harm. On the other hand, da Silva & Krishnamurthy (2016) recommended that medication reconciliation for each prescription would be necessary for ensuring patient safety by including an “indication review” for all prescribed drugs. Izadpanah et al. (2018), in their paper, to assess the frequency and causes of medication errors, concluded that reducing nurses’ workload and increasing awareness of medication errors among the medical professionals would be beneficial in reducing medication errors. Solution The solution to medication errors is dependent on the joint effort of the nurses and other healthcare providers. It should be the responsibility of every healthcare professional to uphold patient safety by counterchecking the medication orders to minimize the chances of drug administration errors. To achieve this, hospitals and health organizations should create awareness and train healthcare providers on the alarming prevalence of medication errors. More importantly, health institutions should increase the workforce, such as nurses, physicians, and pharmacists, directly involved with patient care, particularly in pharmacotherapy. Increasing the workforce means that nurses and relevant healthcare providers have sufficient rest time and work in shifts that allow them to take breaks, day-offs. Analyzing a current health care problem or issues

The relevance of this is that most medication errors, 97.8%, are due to fatigue and work overload among nurses, thus addressing workload and staff insufficiency. Ethical implications The ethical issue of concern about implementing the solution is balancing the care of the patients and efficiency. Increased workforce, especially nurses, means that several nurses will handle one patient due to nurses’ reduction of shifts. This impacts the patients by compromising patient-nurse relationships due to the short-lived interactions with patients and particular nurses. This also, in turn, affects patients’ perception of healthcare and ultimately lowers patient satisfaction, and eventually reduced the quality of care. Implementation Implementing the solution requires recruiting additional nurses in the health institution and training programs to create awareness and identify and detect medication errors. It also requires that adequate nurses be allocated to different wards and a proper work schedule drafted. Recruitment of nurses should be done through advertising of job openings online and in local newspapers. Creating awareness of the same should be done by placing posters within hospital settings and conducting training programs for healthcare providers in hospitals. Recruitment of additional nurses incurs extra budget to the institution, requiring government involvement with the funding.

Conclusion

In conclusion, humans are prone to mistake. However, when the mistake puts someone’s life at stake, the only way to do it is by all possible means to ensure that it does not happen. A joint effort from the government, private sector, and drug manufacturers is required to eliminate the incidences of medication errors and other medical errors. Therefore, the responsibility remains within nurses and physicians and all parties involved in healthcare provision. Analyzing a current health care problem or issues

References

da Silva, B. A., & Krishnamurthy, M. (2016). The alarming reality of medication error: a patient case and review of Pennsylvania and National data. Journal of Community Hospital Internal Medicine Perspectives, 6(4), 31758. https://doi.org/10.3402/jchimp.v6.31758 Gaffney, T. A., Hatcher, B. J., Milligan, R., & Trickey, A. (2016). Enhancing Patient Safety: Factors Influencing Medical Error Recovery Among Medical-Surgical Nurses. Online Journal of Issues in Nursing, 21(3), 6. https://doi.org/10.3912/OJIN.Vol21No03Man06 Gorgich, E. A. C., Barfroshan, S., Ghoreishi, G., & Yaghoobi, M. (2016). Investigating the Causes of Medication Errors and Strategies to Prevention of Them from Nurses and Nursing Student Viewpoint. Global Journal of Health Science, 8(8), 220. https://doi.org/10.5539/gjhs.v8n8p220 Izadpanah, F., Nikfar, S., Bakhshi Imcheh, F., Amini, M., & Zargaran, M. (2018). Assessment of Frequency and Causes of Medication Errors in Pediatrics and Emergency Wards of Teaching Hospitals Affiliated to Tehran University of Medical Sciences (24 Hospitals). Journal of Medicine and Life, 11(4), 299–305. https://doi.org/10.25122/jml-2018-0046