One of the reserves for improving the quality of medical services is to improve the system of medication administration. Issues associated with the arrangement of the mentioned medication administration are a significant part of the unproductive loss of working time, and the fight against them, in addition to social orientation, has a clear economic aspect. The problem becomes considerably acute, especially in the framework of the current conditions, given that the process must not be adversely affected by external factors. Below, the essentials of these issues, as well as opportunities for quality improvement from nurses’ perspectives, will be provided.
The work of medical staff in hospitals is associated with the action of such harmful factors as physical, chemical, biological, and psychophysiological. The main task in the organization of staff work in this area is to create safe working conditions and take measures to prevent issues associated with the provision of appropriate medication administration among patients and medical staff. Therefore, special importance in creating safe medication administration is given to ensuring the prevention of transmission of various complications not only to medical staff but also to other patients.
A plethora of individuals worldwide inevitably take various medications in order to avert or treat different diseases. Nevertheless, drugs may result in harm at times, as well as in disabilities, or even death – in case they are taken inappropriately. It should be emphasized that medication errors are among the essential reasons for avertable insignificant patient outcomes in the framework of the healthcare system (Mekonnen et al., 2018). Medication administration errors should be considered as an important category of medication errors in general, given that they lead to hazardous consequences for patients, healthcare professionals, and the related establishments involved in the industry.
Here, it seems rational to stress that the administration of medications is referred to as the main responsibility of a nurse. According to statistics, he or she tends to spend about half of his or her working time on medication administration (Wondmieneh et al., 2020). Hence, it might be suggested that nurses can be considered as a final safety control within the scope of the mentioned process. They are the last wall that protects a patient’s health in the framework of the issue given.
Medication errors can take place at any of the stages of medication utilization processes. However, most of these errors appear exactly at the phase of medication administration. “The frequently perpetrated types of MAEs include wrong dose, wrong time, wrong drug, wrong route, omission of doses, wrong patient, lack of documentation, and technical errors” (Wondmieneh et al., 2020, p. 2). Such evidence allows assuming that there is a variety of factors – or issues – that can lead to inappropriate administration of medications.
At this point, it is important to highlight an issue that tends to be among the most pressing factors within the scope of medication administration. This is the lack of the necessary experience and background that are related to the administration of administration from the nursing perspective (Miller, Haddad, & Phillip, 2016). The implementation of advanced practices of nursing education can be a great foundation for overcoming this problem. This education should be considered as an organizational, predictable, legitimate component of the development process in the health care system, which allows one to conclude about the continuity of training for nursing leaders and the unification of related sciences for applied purposes of improving the quality of medication administration.
The existing trends in the development of nursing education are due to personnel and organizational and methodological components. These are solved by a gradual change in the importance of the leader as a highly qualified specialist who is able to ensure the organization of the activities of nurses in terms of the administration of medications. Another problem is the lack of personnel with basic higher nursing education and advanced degrees in nursing, which is combined with the low demand for this kind of specialists by practitioners.
In the context of the transformation of the attitude of managers to the organizers of nursing, the development of science presupposes the development and assimilation of systematized knowledge and skills for the implementation of high-quality medication administration. This is a long-term work with social, technological and organizational content; heuristic and quantitative methods are needed to solve it. Empirical and scientific information, useful for organizers of nursing, about the problems of the development of this science for the practice of providing nursing care is contained in collections of materials and articles devoted to certain related areas. Among these are medical and social care, gerontology, general medical practice, psychology, as well as in reports of international scientific conferences.
The immediate tasks of developing nursing education in the framework of the theme may be as follows. These are deepening professional ties with foreign scientists, studying the experience of nursing in the context of medication intake; activation of the interaction of related sciences, structures and associations; expansion of channels of constant communication, including distance learning. Coverage of the necessary components of the educational process, close to the practice of a nurse in the field of taking medications, promising areas of research and organizational and methodological activities carried out in stages.
Together with all educational institutions of a medical and pedagogical orientation, it testifies to positive trends in changes in the nursing leadership training system, which undoubtedly contributes to the more effective functioning of the health care system as a whole.
Nevertheless, professional training is important, but there are many other parameters that, albeit indirectly, indicate the level of quality of life of health workers. This includes satisfaction with one’s profession. An important aspect that can characterize the quality of life of medical workers is the presence or absence of occupational diseases. Hence, a safe and infection-free workplace is important as well; sanitary cleaning of the premises includes general cleaning of the premises and maintenance of cleanliness in the medical institution.
In addition to maintaining cleanliness, the purpose of sanitation is to reduce the number of microorganisms (and, consequently, reduce the risk of infection and accidental infection of patients and staff) (Wagner, Schöne, & Rieger, 2020). This also creates favorable conditions for the provision of services of the highest quality. Nurses of the institution, whose responsibilities include cleaning the premises, are at risk of infection through contact with blood and other body fluids, contaminated with sharp objects, etc.
It seems reasonable to claim that when it comes to the appropriate medication administration – from the perspective given – nurses may be considered as a crucial source of insights. They obtain an understanding of the issues directly at their workplaces, and deal with a plethora of dangerous factors and are to reduce risks. In order to minimize costs and issues in this vein, it was proved that the implementation of related nursing education is required. Taking into account these recommendations, a healthcare facility can coherently and consistently improve its medication administration, diminishing various risks of infections and reducing associated costs.
References
Mekonnen, A. B., Alhawassi, T. M., McLachlan, A. J., & Brien, J. E. (2018). Adverse drug events and medication errors in African hospitals: A systematic review. Drugs – Real World Outcomes, 5(1), 1–24.
Miller, K., Haddad, L., & Phillip, K. D. (2016). Educational strategies for reducing medication errors committed by student nurses: A literature review. International Journal of Health Sciences Education, 3(2), 1–15. Web.
Wagner, A., Schöne, L., & Rieger, M. A. (2020). Determinants of occupational safety culture in hospitals and other workplaces – results from an integrative literature review. International journal of environmental research and public health, 17(18), 6588. Web.
Wondmieneh, A., Alemu, W., Tadele, N., & Demis, A. (2020). Medication administration errors and contributing factors among nurses: a cross sectional study in tertiary hospitals, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. BMC Nursing, 19(4), 1–9. Web.