Abstract:
Background: Medication administration errors affect patients' health and increase mortality among patients. This study assessed medication administration errors among nurses and midwives at the Holy Family Hospital, Nkawkaw. Methods: Using census 231 nurses and midwives were selected. Descriptive statistics using frequencies and percentages, chi-square test and logistic regression analyses were conducted at p-value of 0.05 and at 95% confidence interval.
The greater proportion of participants had experienced medication errors in their professional practice. Nurses and midwives’ contribution to medication errors was more than that of other health professionals. Being despondent about nursing/midwifery, unfamiliar with drugs, high volume of work, and department’s style of supervision and control were causes of medication errors. Unfavourable institutional protocols to reporting errors was a barrier to reporting medication errors. Also, males were 0.349 times less likely to report medication errors than females. Also, participants who had worked for 6-10 years were 24.0 times more likely to report medication errors than those who had worked for less than six years at a health facility. Further, the likelihood of reporting medication errors was high among those who work at the theatre (AOR=7.519), female ward (AOR=19.721) and those who work at the maternity ward (AOR=15.930) than those who work at the emergency ward. Conclusion: Medication error prevention and reporting interventions should be implemented in all facilities especially the emergency wards to reduce medication errors and increase medication error reporting.
