By the end of the presentation, you will learn about your role in implementing and driving the improvement plan. You will also acknowledge why your role is vital to the success of the improvement plan and how your practice can benefit from embracing the role in the plan. Therefore, you will be expected to understand your role and importance in the improvement plan. Furthermore, you will be expected to understand the new skills needed to implement the medication administration improvement plan.
The current medication administration problem in the care home facility is Medication errors. Elderly patients in the care home encounter distinct issues associated with medication errors. There have been various reports of medication errors in the care home caused by nurses failing to uphold the five rights of drug administration: right patient, right medication, right dose, right time, and right route. This has increased the incidence of adverse drug reactions (ADEs).
Medication errors have also led to poor health outcomes due to drug-drug interactions, adverse drug reactions, and drug allergic reactions, which lead to prolonged patient stays. Besides, medication errors lower patients’ quality of life due to adverse outcomes and lead to a negative patient experience with care in the facility.
They have also led to increased healthcare costs due to prolonged hospitalization, increased use of health services, and preventable hospital admissions.
The proposed safety improvement plan is computerized medication reconciliation to reduce medication errors in the care home. Medication reconciliation entails comparing a patient’s medication list with the prescribing physician’s to ensure accuracy of drug type, frequency, dose, and route of medication during hospital admission, transfer, and discharge and reduce medication errors (Tamblyn et al., 2019). Healthcare organizations must maintain and transmit accurate drug information and compare the drug information a patient brings into the hospital with the drugs ordered for the patient by the physician to identify and address discrepancies (Kreckman et al., 2018). Since most medication errors occur at care transition points, we will have a computerized medication reconciliation to reconcile medication lists during admission, transfer, and discharge of patients, which is a major step in improving patient safety.
The computerized medication reconciliation plan seeks to involve a transition of the care team to reduce the number of patients’ medications with errors during hospital admission, discharge, and follow-up visits. This is an electronic system created to correct medication discrepancies at transitions of care for patients (Marien et al., 2018). It will address the medication error problem by reviewing patients’ medication history, resolving medication discrepancies, and identifying the appropriate list of medications for a patient. It will decrease the number of unintentional medication discrepancies at transfers of care. Using information technology will increase the accuracy of documentation used for medication reconciliation and facilitate the reconciliation process.
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