Medication errors and risk areas in a critical care unit.

Aims: The aim of this study was to identify the main medication errors, their causality and the highest risk areas in critical care.

Design: A descriptive, longitudinal and retrospective study.

Methods: We performed a systematic analysis of the prescription, transcription and administration records of 2,634 dose units of medications that were administered to a total of 87 critically ill patients during 2018.

Medication errors and drug knowledge gaps among critical-care nurses: a mixed multi-method study.

Background: Medication errors are a serious and complex problem in clinical practice, especially in intensive care units whose patients can suffer potentially very serious consequences because of the critical nature of their diseases and the pharmacotherapy programs implemented in these patients. The origins of these errors discussed in the literature are wide-ranging, although far-reaching variables are of particular special interest to those involved in training nurses. The main objective of this research was to study if the level of knowledge that critical-care nurses have about the use and administration of medications is related to the most common medication errors.