Nurses Rx: Medication Administration
From George Indest’s Nursing Law Manual Nurses face a busy schedule often including a long list of patients and extensive work hours. As a result, they can become overworked and overtired, which may lead to mistakes when carrying out essential job duties like administering medication. An Institute of Medicine (IOM) report titled To Err is […]
DEA Offers New Prescription Drug Return Policy
By George F. Indest III, J.D., M.P.A., LL.M., Board Certified by The Florida Bar in Health Law Looking to improve the prescription drug abuse epidemic in the United States, the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) announced September 8, 2014, that it would permit patients to return their unused prescription medications to pharmacies. This new rule, covering […]
Nurses: Protect Yourself Against Medication Errors
Nurses face a busy schedule often including a long list of patients and extensive work hours. As a result, they can become overworked and overtired, which may lead to a higher risk of making a mistake when administering medication. An Institute of Medicine (IOM) report titled To Err is Human: Building a Safer Health System (IOM, Dec. 1999) […]
The “Seven Rights” of Patient Medication
There is a checklist every nurse should learn called the “Seven Rights of Medication.” If this checklist is memorized and followed in every case, medication errors would be significantly reduced or eliminated altogether. Every nurse and nursing student should memorize this list and go through it in her mind every time a patient is administered […]