Free Custom «Medication Prescribing Errors » Essay Paper

The Research

The phenomenon under discussion is the errors that healthcare workers make when they prescribe medicines. Healthcare practice shows that healthcare employees may make mistakes in prescription that may lead to serious problems, even to a patients’ death. Hence, the questions related to the phenomenon can be introduced in the following way: what are the main reasons of these mistakes?; do healthcare workers make them because of their inattentiveness or poor skills and knowledge?; and what can one do to reduce the effect of this phenomenon in healthcare practice. It was decided to choose the article written by Abebe Zeleke, Tesfahun Channie and Mirkuzie Woldie. The title of this article is “Medication Prescribing Errors and Associated Factors at the Pediatric Wards of Dessie Referral Hospital, Northeast Ethiopia.”

The Phenomenon

This research targets one of the important aspects of healthcare practice. Errors in prescription indicate that a healthcare institution does not perform its obligations well. As a result, patients who receive prescriptions which contain errors may experience additional harm to their health state. Therefore, analysing this phenomenon is important because the primary goal of healthcare workers is to help people, but not to harm them. This phenomenon has been chosen because it is the aspect of healthcare practice which usually takes place due to healthcare workers’ unconscious actions. In fact, those who make the errors do not realize it, but the consequences of these errors may be very serious. It is necessary to identify the core reasons and try to find solutions which could prevent or minimize the risk of this phenomenon.

The Question

The topic of medication prescribing errors as a recognized clinical formula has been chosen for the research. The choice introduces this phenomenon from the general point of view. In fact, it presents not only the possible consequences of prescription errors, the results of the errors or the effect of these errors, but all these aspects as the components of one general phenomenon. The components of the formula consist of the term that is used for the identification of this aspect in healthcare practice. The clinical formula is presented only by one component, which is also the main aspect of a clinical question. In other words, a clinical question formula chosen for the research contains the components that reflect the main aspect of this formula. Hence, medication prescribing errors is a question formula and the component of this formula at the same time.

The Search

The research employs the database of Dessie Referral Hospital from February 17 to March 17, 2012. These data include the information about prescribed drugs that were collected from patient charts and prescription papers (Zeleke, Channie & Woldie 2014). The statistics identifies the frequency of such cases, age of health workers, their qualification and experience. These data help to research this issue deeper because one has an opportunity to compare different cases and find the similar aspects that could be the main reason for prescription errors. Moreover, these data illustrate the frequency of these cases and the personal information about healthcare workers who committed these mistakes. Hence, there should be a relation between those who make an error and the impact of that error on a patient.

During the research process, such terms as medication errors, prescribing errors, pediatrics, healthcare workers’ competence and healthcare code of ethics have been used in order to complete the task. All these terms and synonyms were necessary to create the general image of the researched phenomenon. They helped to organize the plan of the research and indicated the basic principles of the phenomenon under research. The combination of these terms creates the structure that is divided into certain categories that raise the specific issue. For instance, one aspect is dedicated to the determination of the most frequent errors; another aspect illustrates the specifics of healthcare workers’ obligations that could lead to these errors.

The search was quite successful because the necessary information about all the required aspects has been received. The research has been divided in parts according to the terms employed in the study. Every term explains some specific phenomenon or aspect of this work; hence the work was able to embrace the entire research and include all information required.

The article chosen for the research satisfies the main aspects included in this work. The search was conducted by entering different key words in order to find the article related to the topic. Finally, one of the articles that were in the list was totally relevant to the research.