Incidence of medication errors in a surgical intensive care unit. analisys and improvement measures implemented

Results A total of 634 observations made over weekdays and weekends were performed including morning, noon and night shifts. 36.27 % observations (230) included some type of error, a total of 245 medication errors were detected. According to the type of error found: 52 were prescription errors (21.22%), 2 omissions (0.82%), 44 related to administration technique (wrong speed) (17.96%), 10 omissions of the administration record (4.08%), 97 erroneous preparations (39.59%), 1 wrongly prescribed dose by default (0.41 %) and 3 by excess (1.22%), 5 errors related to erroneous administration route (2.04%), 2 erroneous drug monitorization (0.82 %) and 29 transcription errors (11.84%). According to severity within categories established by the National Coordinating Council for Medication Error Reporting and Prevention (NCCMERP), 26.12% errors were Category A, 10.20% were Category B, 61.63% were Category C, 1.63% Category D and 0.41 % Category F.