What Is More Important Than An Error In Medication

As a student or a professional, a possible medication error is one of the greatest fears, because making a med error results in getting booted from the program. The problem is how can somebody be 100% sure he is doing the right thing?

One of the points I want stress is that medication errors happen. I also want stress that, despite of health providers' best efforts and other peoples' expectations, we are not now and never will be perfect. We all make mistakes, it is human. I make them. You make them. Everyone makes them. Students, nurses, doctors and the rest people involved in medical care must understand this, and also must understand that they will make mistakes too. Every body's day will come for sure.

I further want to stress that we must admit our mistakes. It may make us feel uncomfortable and a little stupid for a short time, but it's preferable to patients suffering the effects of uncorrected errors for a long time. When somebody chooses to become a professional health care, he must accept that he must be responsible of his mistakes when the time will come. I know that preservation of self-image is part of human nature, nobody can be different. As humans we are tempted to hide our goof ups whenever we can. But more important is to understand that medication error is part of your work, and your first duty is to remove its consequences as fast as you can, and second, to think how you can help other people like you to not make it.