Current Pediatric Research

MEDICATION ERRORS IN PEDIATRIC EMERGENCY SETTINGS

GENERAL PEDIATRICS, ADOLESCENT MEDICINE AND NEONATOLOGY CONGRESS
December 12-13 ,2018 | Abu Dhabi ,UAE

Hussein Ahmad Muad

Al Zahra Hospital, UAE

Scientific Tracks Abstracts : Curr Pediatr Res

DOI: 10.4066/0971-9032-C3-008

Abstract:

Medication errors are still one of the significant challenging problems that affect patient safety around the world. It is shown in the literature that pediatric patients are at high risk for the medication errors, especially in the emergency setting, ED, PICU, and NICU. Medication errors could occur in many occasions such as; choosing the medication, writing the prescription, deciding which formula to be used, dispensing the medication, and administering the drug. Apparently, the drug dosing error is higher in the pediatric patients due to lack of standardization of dosage according to the age variation, incorrect weight, and wrong calculation. It is observed, particularly in emergency situations, that medication errors are more frequent because of the verbal orders, physician involvement in many simultaneous tasks, lack of medication verification by the pharmacist, human- related factors such as fatigue and stress, look-alike sound-alike medication, and miscommunication related to language barriers. Enhancing the error reporting system to learn from experience in a blame-free culture is the cornerstone to eliminate the medication error or near miss to prevent harm reach the patients. Also, there are many interventions such as; Computerized Physician Order Entry (CPOE), conducting safety walk around to help the leaders in learning from the firstline clinical staff, continuous education for the nurses and physicians regarding patient safety, color-coded prefilled syringe, and precalculated doses depending on length-based tape (Broselow tape). Overall, it is evidence that it is worth for the organizations to invest in patient safety which will enhance the health outcomes.

Biography:

Hussein Ahmad Muad is a pediatrician and neonatologist at Al Zahra Hospital, UAE. He graduated from Damascus University, then completed training in Pediatric and Neonatology in Syria to become a board certified. He achieved his fellowship and membership from International Society for Quality in Healthcare ISQua. He pursued MSc in healthcare management from the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland RCSI. He had a certificate in Quality and Safety from the Institute for Health Improvement (IHI). He has a particular interest and skills in healthcare quality, patient safety, clinical audit, research, and global projects that are improving health outcomes.

E-mail: husmuad@hotmail.com

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