Interrupting a Nurse Increases Chances for Medication Errors

• 5/13/2010
• Author: Janet Pimentel
• Category: The Source Blog
• 11069 Views
• 0 Comments
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I recently accompanied my 72-year-old father to the hospital for eye surgery. While waiting in the pre-op area before the procedure, my dad decided he wanted his wallet from a locked cabinet so he called out to a nurse he saw in the hallway. He failed to realize that the nurse was standing at a medication cart and closely looking over a clipboard, as she may have been double checking the medications on the cart. I quickly asked my dad to stop calling out to her because she was busy working with medications. I told him that interrupting a nurse when she is working with medications can increase the chances of a medication error occurring. I then asked him how he would feel if someone else kept interrupting a nurse who was preparing his much-needed heart medication. He answered that he wouldn’t like that at all.

Later that day I was driving my dad home from the hospital. While we were listening to the radio, a news announcer mentioned that a new study by the University of Sydney in Australia determined that as the number of distractions for nurses increases, so do the number of medication errors and the risk to patient safety. For instance, the study says that four interruptions in the course of a single drug administration doubled the likelihood that the patient would experience a major mishap. One suggested remedy was for hospitals to have a “protected hour” during which nurses would focus on medication administration without having to do such things as take phone calls or answer pages. I reminded my dad that the news announcer was discussing the same thing that we did in the pre-op area. My dad said it never occurred to him that interrupting any nurse could have a negative affect on her job or even another patient. I think it never occurs to most people. It occurs to me because two of my best friends are nurses and I hear their point of view quite a bit while meeting for coffee on a Sunday morning. In fact, I made sure to give both of them a big hug during Nurses Week (celebrated May 6 through May 12).

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