College Essay On Patient Safety
Patient Safety: Induction
Every healthcare workers main focus is to make sure that their patient is safe. But according to the Ulrich and Kear, “one million people were injured and 98,000 died from medical related errors” (2014). In a health care setting, a medical error can be something as simple as a nurse forgetting to put the side rail of the bed up after giving care, resulting to the patient falling and getting injured. To a more complex matter as a nurse gives the patient a wrong medication and dies. Medical errors can be prevented by healthcare workers just by using common sense, but facilities that educate their staff have a better outcome with patient safety and also knowing, you the care provider had an error. …show more content…
Leadership in Safety
Nurses play a big part in patient safety and according to Ulrich and Kear, “how well we are cared for by nurses affects our health, and sometimes can be a matter of life or death” (2014). Nurses are the backbone of healthcare and also the nursing staff, because they are with the patient 24 hours a day and give the most care. Meaning patient safety is mostly in the nurses hands. Nurses’ actions can be affected by their working environment because nurses have to work with what they have and do the best they can, but this is leading to problems with patient safety. To help with patient safety, the Ulrich and Kear stated, “Transformational leadership and evidence- based management, maximizing workforce capability, design of work and work space to prevent and mitigate errors, and creating and sustaining a culture of safety” (2014). Leadership is a major part of patient safety because everyone in the patient’s care team needs to be on the same page. Therefore someone needs to put that care plan in effect, whether that is a charge nurse or supervisor. Especially when it comes to safety. Workforce capability can also affect patient safety by having the staff doing ten different things at a time or even being overstaffed can cause problems and that affects the patients the most. Yet if a patient has to go to the bathroom and a CNA is busy with another patient and all other healthcare workers are busy, the patient may get out of bed and fall. The facility may have to change the patient to health worker ratio. Today facilities do have a good patient to health worker’s ratio according to the Academy of medical- surgical nurses, “A good staffing plan will need to have contingencies built for periods of increased/ decreased census, patient safety needs, and flexibility due to staff skill level and mix” (AMSN.org 2015). Work space causes issues for patient safety for example slippery floors, can cause injury to a patient and staff at facilities need to be educated on safety and use common sense. Patient Education for Safety
Education is the key for preventing medical errors and can have a positive impacted on patient safety.
Education is continuous and has changed over the years. That is why facilities need to have continuous education options and in service training. (Ulrich & Kear 2014) stated that “Medical education has also more emphasis on patient safety… Achieving greater patient safety requires a fundamental culture change across all phases of medical education”. Education not only helps the healthcare staff but also the patient, because patient education can also keep the patient safe. If a patient has never used crutches and tries to use them without the proper way to use them, the patient can be injured. Possibly patient education can keep the patient out of the hospital. Our role as a nurse is to teach and a lot of hospitals use interactive patient education technique’s to help patients on hospital discharges. According to the Boston University Krames Patient Education, “Patients who have a clear understand of their after-hospital care instructions, including how to take their medicines and when to make follow up appointments, are 30 percent less likely to be readmitted or visit the emergency department than patients who lack this information.” (n.d.).Facilities also have programs called in services that educates the staff of certain problems or issues. For example if a patient falls out of bed the director will educate their staff on patient safety, like lowering the bed and …show more content…
putting up the side rails after giving care. Education also teaches healthcare workers of previous safety problems and reflects on that problem and fixes it. Safety Prevention
We as healthcare workers can not completely stop patient safety issues from happening, but we can prevent and learn from pervious related problems.
(Ulrich & Kear 2014) developed a questionnaire regarding patient safety “How often do we harm patients?” And “How often do we provide the interventions the patient should receive?” … “How do we know we learned from defects?” As a healthcare provider we don’t usually think about the first question but we think about the last, how do we learn from this and prevent it from happening again. But as a healthcare worker we need to focus on all three questions to learn from this problem. This will also make people better care
providers. Conclusion
Patient safety will always be a number one priority for healthcare providers, but in the real world medical errors will never go away. We as a healthcare need to try our best and reduce the number of medical related injuries and deaths. Some measures such as handing your hands or raising that side that can make a difference. In the article “Patient Safety and Patient Safety Culture: Foundations of Excellent Health Care Delivery”, it mentioned, Medical education for healthcare professionals and even education for patients to prevent going back to the hospital. The article also talked about safety and how to learn from other patient safety altercations. You as a healthcare provider needs to know when you are at fault when it comes to patient safety, and how to learn from it. Because in the end the patient’s life is at stake.
References
Academy of Medical-Surgical. (2015).
Retrieved from https://www.amsn.org/practice-resources/care-team-reference/staffing/question-what-suggested-nursepatient-ratio-and
Reducing Hospital Readmissions with Enhanced Patient Education. (n.d).
Retrieved from https://www.bu.edu/fammed/projectred/publications/news/krames_dec_final.pdf
Ulrich, B., & Kear, T. (2014). Patient Safety and Patient Safety Culture:
Foundations of Excellent Health Care Delivery. 41(5). Retrieved Sept. & Oct., 2014, from https://www.annanurse.org/download/reference/journal/ patientsafety1.pdf.
Every healthcare workers main focus is to make sure that their patient is safe. But according to the Ulrich and Kear, “one million people were injured and 98,000 died from medical related errors” (2014). In a health care setting, a medical error can be something as simple as a nurse forgetting to put the side rail of the bed up after giving care, resulting to the patient falling and getting injured. To a more complex matter as a nurse gives the patient a wrong medication and dies. Medical errors can be prevented by healthcare workers just by using common sense, but facilities that educate their staff have a better outcome with patient safety and also knowing, you the care provider had an error. …show more content…
Leadership in Safety
Nurses play a big part in patient safety and according to Ulrich and Kear, “how well we are cared for by nurses affects our health, and sometimes can be a matter of life or death” (2014). Nurses are the backbone of healthcare and also the nursing staff, because they are with the patient 24 hours a day and give the most care. Meaning patient safety is mostly in the nurses hands. Nurses’ actions can be affected by their working environment because nurses have to work with what they have and do the best they can, but this is leading to problems with patient safety. To help with patient safety, the Ulrich and Kear stated, “Transformational leadership and evidence- based management, maximizing workforce capability, design of work and work space to prevent and mitigate errors, and creating and sustaining a culture of safety” (2014). Leadership is a major part of patient safety because everyone in the patient’s care team needs to be on the same page. Therefore someone needs to put that care plan in effect, whether that is a charge nurse or supervisor. Especially when it comes to safety. Workforce capability can also affect patient safety by having the staff doing ten different things at a time or even being overstaffed can cause problems and that affects the patients the most. Yet if a patient has to go to the bathroom and a CNA is busy with another patient and all other healthcare workers are busy, the patient may get out of bed and fall. The facility may have to change the patient to health worker ratio. Today facilities do have a good patient to health worker’s ratio according to the Academy of medical- surgical nurses, “A good staffing plan will need to have contingencies built for periods of increased/ decreased census, patient safety needs, and flexibility due to staff skill level and mix” (AMSN.org 2015). Work space causes issues for patient safety for example slippery floors, can cause injury to a patient and staff at facilities need to be educated on safety and use common sense. Patient Education for Safety
Education is the key for preventing medical errors and can have a positive impacted on patient safety.
Education is continuous and has changed over the years. That is why facilities need to have continuous education options and in service training. (Ulrich & Kear 2014) stated that “Medical education has also more emphasis on patient safety… Achieving greater patient safety requires a fundamental culture change across all phases of medical education”. Education not only helps the healthcare staff but also the patient, because patient education can also keep the patient safe. If a patient has never used crutches and tries to use them without the proper way to use them, the patient can be injured. Possibly patient education can keep the patient out of the hospital. Our role as a nurse is to teach and a lot of hospitals use interactive patient education technique’s to help patients on hospital discharges. According to the Boston University Krames Patient Education, “Patients who have a clear understand of their after-hospital care instructions, including how to take their medicines and when to make follow up appointments, are 30 percent less likely to be readmitted or visit the emergency department than patients who lack this information.” (n.d.).Facilities also have programs called in services that educates the staff of certain problems or issues. For example if a patient falls out of bed the director will educate their staff on patient safety, like lowering the bed and …show more content…
putting up the side rails after giving care. Education also teaches healthcare workers of previous safety problems and reflects on that problem and fixes it. Safety Prevention
We as healthcare workers can not completely stop patient safety issues from happening, but we can prevent and learn from pervious related problems.
(Ulrich & Kear 2014) developed a questionnaire regarding patient safety “How often do we harm patients?” And “How often do we provide the interventions the patient should receive?” … “How do we know we learned from defects?” As a healthcare provider we don’t usually think about the first question but we think about the last, how do we learn from this and prevent it from happening again. But as a healthcare worker we need to focus on all three questions to learn from this problem. This will also make people better care
providers. Conclusion
Patient safety will always be a number one priority for healthcare providers, but in the real world medical errors will never go away. We as a healthcare need to try our best and reduce the number of medical related injuries and deaths. Some measures such as handing your hands or raising that side that can make a difference. In the article “Patient Safety and Patient Safety Culture: Foundations of Excellent Health Care Delivery”, it mentioned, Medical education for healthcare professionals and even education for patients to prevent going back to the hospital. The article also talked about safety and how to learn from other patient safety altercations. You as a healthcare provider needs to know when you are at fault when it comes to patient safety, and how to learn from it. Because in the end the patient’s life is at stake.
References
Academy of Medical-Surgical. (2015).
Retrieved from https://www.amsn.org/practice-resources/care-team-reference/staffing/question-what-suggested-nursepatient-ratio-and
Reducing Hospital Readmissions with Enhanced Patient Education. (n.d).
Retrieved from https://www.bu.edu/fammed/projectred/publications/news/krames_dec_final.pdf
Ulrich, B., & Kear, T. (2014). Patient Safety and Patient Safety Culture:
Foundations of Excellent Health Care Delivery. 41(5). Retrieved Sept. & Oct., 2014, from https://www.annanurse.org/download/reference/journal/ patientsafety1.pdf.