Reference no: EM133667873

Question

As stated on College of Ontario's Code of Conduct (2023), nurses are expected to provide safe and competent care. And this is quite important particularly during medication time as the nurse is the last line of defense from medication error. The 10 rights of medication administration (Kozier et.al., 2018) have been a helpful guide in our daily task of giving medication. Currently I work in a hospital that uses EPIC. With this system, medication error is miniscule as both patient and medication are scanned prior to administration. This ensures that the right client is getting the right medication, with the right route, dose and time verified at the same time. If there is any discrepancy, an alert or warning will appear if an incorrect patient band or medication bar code has been scanned. Once scanned, medication administration will be automatically documented. The remaining rights that I need to enforce are rights to refuse, patient education, assessment and evaluation. A good example is the use of stool softeners and laxatives like sennokot and lactulose. Some of our patients are post operative ones receiving opiod narcotics, a number of them develop constipation hence are on regular schedule of these medications. Before giving said medications I do ask patients about their bowel movement, like frequency and character. I do explain what the medications are for, then ask if patient is okay to receive said drugs while educating them with its uses. At times patient will ask to skip a dose if they're passing stool regularly or stool has changed to a softer consistency. There is a situation when patient already has soft and frequent stools but I have to advise them not to stop taking lactulose as patient has hepatic encephalopathy.