Applying the Background and Methodology of the Research Process The problem that this study was conducted to solve was how to make a Patient-controlled analgesia safer for the patient. The Patient-controlled analgesia is a common and effective means of managing postoperative pain. The complex processes and equipment associated with the setup, programming and administration of intravenous or epidural PCA have allowed it to become a significant source of many preventable medication errors. This problem needs to be study to find a way to prevent future errors from happening.
Health care administrators need to study the errors made when using the PCA with the data collected they can help prevent any more adverse effects of the medications errors associated with the PCA. There are two types of errors with the PCA and are classified into two categories as human errors which are operator error and equipment errors which are malfunctions of the machine. The purpose of the study was to find ways to prevent medication errors when using a PCA in postoperative pain. The study will find out what errors are common and find a way to prevent these errors from reoccurring.
The main research question is how to describe PCA medication errors and examine systems and modalities that may help reduce the future incidence of these errors. The hypothesis is that after studying these errors involving the PCA the researchers will find ways to prevent the errors from reoccurring and in turn making the patients safer. The independent variables are the things such as programming the machine because it is different for each patient and the amounts each patient should receive is a independent variable too.
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The dependent variables are things such as the steps that it takes for the set up of the machine. The machine must be set up the same every time the only thing that is different is the medication and the amount that is being given. This study was more of a conceptual model. It gather the information and then used the gathered information to find ways to help reduce the medication errors that were being made concerning the PCA machine. The literature review showed the statistics of how often the errors were happening and the effects of the errors.
It showed that the errors were causing adverse effects for the patient and sometimes causing fatalities. It showed that the errors were not always the fault of the operator but at times was the fault of the machine malfunctioning. The study design that was used is case series and case reports. There was an organization named Med Marx, it is a voluntary and anonymous online medication error reporting database. It has 1. 3 million reported medication errors. The study covered a five year period and in that time frame there were 5,377 PCA- related errors reported. Of these 7.
9% were harmful to the patient the most common PCA – related errors was identified by the system was improper dose/quantity at 38. 9%. Unauthorized drug were at 18. 4% and omission error was at 17. 6%. The study lead the researchers to the conclusion that with the advances in infusion pumps such as the smart pump developed to help reduce these type of errors these pumps provide feedback to the programmer regarding drug dosages. Even so the potential for medication errors is not completely eliminated. In closing, this study was done to find ways to decrease the amount of medication errors involving PCA.
The patient-control analgesia is still the best way for a patient to control pain after a surgery because the patient can control when they get the medication for pain by pushing a button. The patient no longer has to wait on a nurse to have time to administer the medication reducing the time the patient is in pain. With this study they found many of the reasons for the medication errors and ways to reduce them such as using smart pumps that give feedback to the person programming the machine to ensure that the dosage is right. It will not stop every medication error but it will help reduce them.
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