Prevention of Medical Errors Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Prevention of Medical Errors - Essay Example At whatever cost, appropriate preventive measures should be prevented to avoid the numerous adverse effects associated with medical errors. Indeed, medical errors have been noted to have adverse effects on the patient, the hospital and community at large. First, medical errors cause what the American Society of Registered Nurses, ASRN (2008) refers to as adverse medical events which basically include death and disability. The institution gives an example of a lawsuit in which Beverly Health Care centre in West Virginia was sued for causing the death of Edward Wilson’s wife through a medical error. It was alleged that the claimant’s wife died as a result of acute pneumonia contracted from multiple bacterial infections which developed because of the poor infection control measures while the patient was under assisted breathing. It was also noted that the nurse ignored routine safety checks conducted during assisted breathing. Other than such adverse effects and reputational damage, medical errors also have adverse economic implications to individuals and the government at large. As documented by Andel, et al . (2012), such errors cost the US government $19.5 billion in 2008. Of these, $17 billion was directly spent on additional medical cost. As such, proper measures should be undertaken to prevent medical errors. Understanding the causes of these medical errors would play a critical role in ensuring that appropriate preventive measures are adopted. A majority of these errors occur because of non-adherence to safety measures at the point of care. As such, ASRN (2008) observes that medical errors occur due to incorrectly computing drug calculations, fatigue, time pressures, understaffing, design deficiencies, inexperience, inadequate equipment and failure to follow or lack of knowledge on established protocol. Such factors cause errors involving infusion of high-risk