Medication Safety SWOT Analysis

Medication error is a failure in the treatment process that leads to, or has the potential to lead to, harm to the patients (Ferner, R., & Aronson, J. (n.d.).
It is an unnecessary threat to patients and it costs conservatively about 750 million pounds yearly in England (“Safety in doses,” 2007). That money can be used to serve more patients if we can eliminate the error. Therefore, we should take zero tolerance to the incident.

The following aims to develop a strategic plan according to the results of SWOT analysis and develop an action plan for those three most important strategies .There are 4 strategies according to the results of SWOT analysis and internal factors are regarded as those factors in individual ward and external factors are
It includes some issues such as the update of HA Do Not Use List in prescribing, sharing of good practices. Some good practices can also be adopted as usual ward practices. (Medication Safety Bulletin Vol. 6, 2013)
Ward manager can encourage nurses to participate into self- medication program (SMP). It shows that SMP can increase the nurses’ medication knowledge so as to reduce medication error (Grantham et al., n.d.) and patient may be more familiar with the drug so that if wrong drug is given to the patient, they may doubt the wrong drug and thus prevent the medication error though it is something that we do not want to see.
Ward managers and their staff can attend the forum organized by the medication safety committee to discuss the effectiveness of Inpatient medication order entry (IPMOE) which is a closed system about ordering, dispensing and administrating medication. Recommendations can be brought back to ward for easier adaptation of using IPMOE (I.T. Lau
The technicians can share the situation in US with the physicians and nurses and thus modify the IPMOE. A pilot test can be carried in acute hospital such as PMH for one year. Project view and system review can be carried afterwards for half a year (Cheung, (n.d)).
Until now the contract of TUNS is mostly 2 months during seasonal influenza period. Department operation manager (DOM) can discuss with ward manager about extending the contract period of TUNS to half a year or one year so that the TUNS can be more familiar with the medication in ward and be more confident to the usual correct practice. Ward manager can communicate with the staff and DOM to discuss the workload monthly and the effectiveness of TUNS. Ward manager can contact the human resources department of the cluster to request a TUNS if