Assessing Intravenous Medication Administration among Nurses in the Emergency Department of the Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital

Introduction: Patient safety is a major concept in the provision of health care and a significant factor in the maintenance of quality health care services. Medication errors are among one of patients’ safety issues which needs to be dealt with because of consequences it poses to the patient. Intravenous medications administrations have high incidence of error but there is limited evidence of associated factors or error severity.

Objectives: The objective was to evaluate which elements such as nurses' knowledge, training needs, behaviour, and attitude could prevent medication errors in the emergency department during the administration of intravenous (IV) medications.

Methodology: The study used quantitative descriptive design. One hundred and thirty-nine (139) nurses were selected using a simple random sampling method. Open and closed ended structured questionnaires were used as the data collection tool and analysed with Stata Version 15.1 (IBM) Program. Descriptive and Inferential Statistics were employed to analyse the data.

Results and Finding: The results from the study indicated that more than half (65%) of the respondents had adequate knowledge on IV medication administration. Also less than half (19.4%) of the respondents had correct answers on the calculation and dosing of IV medications. The majority (55%) of respondents have poor attitude and poor behaviour (53%) towards IV drug administration. Training on IV medication administration was significant on the behaviour of nurses.

Conclusion: Training should be maximized on calculation and dosing skills of nurses. There should be regular update on the knowledge of nurses on IV medication administration to improve the safety of patients. Standardised reporting systems should be available in the facility so that errors will be captured and audited to reduce the incidence of errors.