Role of Nursing Staff in Eliminating Medical Errors

The article focuses on the role that nurses play in eliminating errors in various medical situations. The research focused on the relationship between the number of nurses and the prevalence of medical errors. The study unveiled many reasons why medical errors occur. Some medical errors are caused by interruption of the nurses while working or understaffing in various healthcare facilities. The study reveals that the nurses play an important role in reducing the medical errors because they are responsible for administering the medication and monitoring the progress of the patients. Major medical errors are common when few nurses are made to handle many patients. The study shows that when the workload is high, the nurses tend to take short cuts to ensure they deliver the service. As a result, medical errors result from omission of some steps, missing the proper order of procedures, and prescribing wrong/overdosing drugs. Often, medical errors occur during medical administrations, transcribing, and dispensations (Frith et al., 2012). The article shows that some of the errors are often a detriment to the health of the patients. Some medical errors result in the death of patients and permanent physical impairment for some patients.

The analysis of the study showed that medical errors are insignificant in some occasions. Examples of minor errors include improper dosage, wrong timing of the medication, and missing a step in a medical procedure. The errors hamper service delivery because their work involves handling the patients, advising the doctors on the progress of the patients, and information on patient discharge. The errors are manageable with good staffing of nurses and a reasonable number of patients in the health care. The findings from the study show that it is essential to handle... The patient education is one of the elements that reduce medical errors. Literate patients can help nurses follow medical procedures when the number of patients that nurses handle is large. Clearly, the errors have a cost implication and therefore the need to introduce measures to prevent the errors in the hospital. Often, medical errors cause the increase in the patient readmissions and lawsuits when the implications of the errors are severe. The solutions to medical errors depend on decisions made by the management and commitment to staffing their facilities adequately.

Implication of the Topic to the Health Promotion

The issue of medical errors is rampant in the modern society. Most health facilities are private businesses, and the owners are seeking to minimize cost and maximize profits. As a result, the private hospitals have few nurses attending many patients who end up being overworked, fatigued, and prone to mistakes. The medical errors are accidental and thus the need to address the matter because it is urgent. The topic addresses the problem in the modern health care that lowers the quality of services from the health care. The topic is important as it offers an avenue where solutions to the problem of medical errors are identified.

The concept of patient education is important in healthcare delivery. Often, literate patients can help nurses in reducing the number of medical errors like improper dosage or skipping medical procedures. Since illiteracy contributes to the errors, the introduction of patient education has helped reduce medical errors in many ways. For example, many patients know how to manage their health conditions and help the nurses in monitoring their healing process. The increase in the cases of medical errors has…