Barriers and Facilitators of Voluntary Medication Errors Reporting According to the Nursing Staff in India

Medication errors (MEs) are common among nursing staff due to the fear or lack of knowledge and time in reporting MEs.

This study aims to identify the barriers and facilitators of voluntary ME reporting according to the nursing staff in India.

This cross-sectional study was conducted on 398 nurses of a hospital in India, working in three different shifts with various specialties, who were selected by a convenience sampling method. A validated questionnaire was used to collect data which was prepared in Google Forms. The chi-square test was used to determine whether there was any statistical difference among the responses.

Results showed that 87% of nurses were female and 13% were male. The majority were at an age range of 31–40 years (44.9%) and had good knowledge of MEs and the reporting system in the hospital (96.2%). Regarding the barriers, 29.9% (P<0.001) were a beginner in using the reporting system, while 70% had prior experience with the system; 85.4% (P=0.024) reported the lack of a relaxing working environment, 54.7% (P=0.031) reported burnout, 27.6% (P=0.0001) reported personnel problems, 21.6% (P<0.001) reported peer pressure and so on. Receiving support and encouragement from the multi-disciplinary team (91.7%), receiving feedback for the reported MEs that focuses on the system and not on the individuals (90.7%), professional encouragement for the reported MEs (90.4%), and developing a “no-blame” culture (86.9%) were the facilitators of the voluntary ME reporting by the nursing staffs (none of them were statistically significant). 

Although it is impractical to eliminate all MEs, the engagement of nursing staff is essential in ME reduction and prevention.