Quality and Safety Education for Nurses 2

Quality and Safety Education for Nurses
Joain Silvera
Nova Southeastern University

Quality and Safety Education for Nurses
The Quality and Safety Education for Nurses abbreviated as QSEN is a project that aims to meet the challenges involved in the preparation of future nurses. One of the main objectives is to impart the nurses with knowledge, skills as well as attitudes, which are necessary for the improvement of safety and quality within the healthcare systems in which they work. The application of QSEN is helping the nurses to avoid ugly scenarios and to make avoidable mistakes with patients or their families (Cronenwett, Sherwood & Gelmon, 2009). There is a need to describe a particular event that took place in the clinical sector which caused the negative outcome. A discussion of the absence of six QSEN competencies in the scenario is made, as well as the importance of integrating them into clinical practice, nursing education and nursing research.
Scenario
In a certain medical institution, an eighty years old man almost died after what is suspected to be a result of a nurse’s negligence. The elderly man had been diagnosed with hypertension and myocardial infraction after immediately arriving at the hospital. He was undergoing some treatments that would treat the ailment and improvement had started to register with an impressive rate. A certain nurse was in charge of him and on her third night of being with him a medication error occurred. She was responsible to administer his medication, ensuring that the man has taken every dose at the right time and the right route according to hospital protocols. Also, the doctor had checked on the patient on the first critical stages when the man arrived in the hospital, but left the responsibility to the nurse after noting the progress. The nurse was doing a very good job in caring for the patient as she would ensure that he has taken his prescribed drugs, and would insist that he takes enough sleep so that he can recover soon. The elderly man was pleased with the nurse as she would listen as he talks about the frustrations of life, especially of losing his beloved wife. The nurse would then professionally encourage him and this made him more comfortable with her after every conversation. It reached a time when the nurse was caught up in personal issues and her care performance started deteriorating. She seemed mostly drawn aback and even her co-workers noted the change and asked her if everything was alright. When it was time to administer the medication she pulled three bottles of certain medication. For example Clarithromycin but two was Clarithromycin and the other one was Ciprofloxacin. She also pulled other medications that belonged to other patients that she was caring for. Everything was on the wow and she went into the patient room to administer the medication. She didn’t scan the meds individual; she only had scan one bottle three times. Then she administered the medication to the patient and a medication error occurred which she noticed after the administration of the drugs. She did an incident report and called the doctor. During the course of the night, she paid much closed attention to the patient.
This incident reflects complete ignorance in regard to nurse’s responsibility. The nurse had allowed her personal issues to affect the performance of health care, which could have resulted to loss of life. The QSEN competencies which are important for the application of safety and quality care are barely seen in this incident. The competency of patient-centered care requires the nurses to recognize the designee or patient as the cause of control as well as full partner in the provision of coordinated and compassionate care that is founded on esteem for the preferences, needs, and values of the patient. In this incident, the nurse had done a commendable job initially but lost her balance when personal problems came. She could not even note her delays in offering medication to the man, while if she had spent time to administer the medication following hospital protocol, this incident could have been avoided. The act of giving a patient the wrong medication may affect his recovery pattern or even fail to help in the recovery at all, and this is an unethical practice. According to patient-centered care, nurses should always be dedicated to the well-being of their patients frequently observing on the progress or the deterioration so that they may make the necessary step. Moreover, they are advised during the practice to be in charge of their emotions and ensure that it does not affect their work, as they are entrusted with people’s lives. The nurse did not portray any skills of competency in assessing the emotional and physical aspects because her early observation would have helped in saving the man’s life.
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