Medication Error

Medical errors cost lives, and they cost health care organizations valuable resources. Nurses are often confused about their ethical as well as legal obligations, especially with a complex, constantly changing, global healthcare marketplace. Few medical errors are completely straightforward. Most incidents involve multiple actors and numerous stakeholders. Nurses are being increasingly challenged to combine deontological with utilitarian ethical viewpoints, an endeavor that is as challenging as the work of healthcare itself.

The Case

(from Hurley & Berghahn, 2010)

A nurse with 16 years of experience was working her third shift in 24 hours, one of which was a double shift. She spent last night sleeping in the hospital. Currently, the nurse was caring for two patients. One was a pregnant teenager admitted for labor induction. The patient tested positive for streptococcus, and a medical resident wrote an order for penicillin.

To prepare for the patient's procedure, the nurse...
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