Speakers
Akeau Unahalekhaka
Chiang Mai University, ThailandTitle: Effective prevention of medication errors to promote patient safety
Abstract:
Patients have two main risks when they are hospitalized-infectious and non-infectious risks. Infectious risks are healthcareassociated infections and non-infectious risks are medical errors. Both risks can cause serious consequences to the patients and their families from longer hospital stay, higher costs of treatment, disability to death. Medication error is an important medical error. Protection of the patients from medication errors need high alert, strong intention, sustain collaboration and implementation among multidisciplinary hospital personnel. In order to effectively protect the patients from medication errors, hospital personnel should recognize the magnitude and severity of the problems which need good surveillance and reporting system, aware of the consequences, impacts and burdens from the incidents, understand causes and risk factors of medication errors. This information is very useful to determine effective and practical preventive measures. Attitude of hospital personnel is important in reporting medication errors to recognize the real situation. It is necessary to encourage hospital personnel to identify and promptly report any errors that have been occurred. Significant gains cannot be accomplished without organizational policies and procedures. Besides, implementation of preventive measures to obtain good sustainable outcomes, healthcare facilities have to identify barriers which can impact the outcomes of the intervention. Prevention of medication errors can be achieved by collaborative quality improvement, establishing medication safety and reporting system, monitoring practices and feedback the incidents to personnel.
Biography:
Akeau Unahalekhaka is a professor for Department of Public Health Nursing and Master of Nursing Science Program in Nursing Care for Patient with Infectious Disease and Infection Control at Faculty of Nursing, Chiang Mai University, Thailand. She graduated Bachelor degree in Nursing, Master and Ph.D. in Epidemiology, received Diploma Thai Board of Nursing Care of Infectious Disease Patient and Infection Control from Thailand Nursing and Midwifery Council, Cert. in Surveillance and Applied Epidemiology for HIV and AIDS from CDC and Cert. in Statistical, Epidemiological and Operational Methods Applied in Medicine and Public Health from University of Brussels, Belgium. She worked as a Disease Control Officer and Chief of Planning & Evaluation Section at Division of Epidemiology, Ministry of Public Health, Thailand for 14 years. She was a president of Nursing Association for Prevention and Control of Infections (NAPCI) during 2013-2016.