Medication Administration (Nursing)

00:00 I'm Joanna, and we're going to talk about medication administration.

00:05 Medication administration is extremely important. Errors can result in a violation of the patient's privacy, cause serious harm, or even death. I'm going to give you a brief overview about what we'll review today. Key terms, medication safety, documentation, and the nursing process. Here are some key terms that you will see during medication administration. If any of these look unfamiliar to you, write them out, look up the meaning, and practice saying them out loud in front of a mirror or to your friends. It's also really helpful if you visualize yourself as the nurse having these conversations to a patient. In medication administration, it's the nurse's responsibility to understand why the patient needs the medication before giving it. So give the medication as ordered, unless you find an error, you should notify the provider immediately. How the medication works, instructions for the patient, and common side effects. The nurse should always perform three checks, that is checking that is the right medication, the right dose, and the right patient at least three times before administering the medication. Check if it's correct when obtaining the vial, check if it's correct before removing the vial, and check if it's correct before actually giving the medication. When you're performing the three checks, you want to make sure you know the six rights. I call them 6 Rights + Some. Depending on where you work, your organization may add other rights.

01:43 So we'll review those too. The six rights are the right medication, the right dose, the right client, the right route, the right time, and the right documentation. Those other rights are right education, right evaluation, right assessment, the right to refuse, and that the patient exhibits the right response.

02:10 Nurses should be cautious.

02:15 Medication errors can occur. Some common causes of these errors are not washing your hands. The nurse should wash their hands before and then after medication administration. Use gloves and sterile technique if necessary.

02:32 Not documenting the medication can also have serious consequences. So the nurse that comes behind you, if it wasn't documented, wasn't given. Not assessing the patient before administration. Many medications have serious side effects, for instance, respiratory depression. If you don't assess the respiratory function before administration, it can have some very serious effects. An improper dosage calculation and using look-a-like sound-a-like drugs, these are all really important to be cautious of when performing medication administration.

03:10 Now, we'll talk about some dosing calculations. This first one is the one you'll probably use the most often. It is simply desire over availability times the quantity. That is the medication as its order divided by how you have it available and times that by how much you need. The next dosing calculation we'll review is drip rates. You'll use these in a variety of IV fluids and it's an important concept to understand. You take the volume, you times that by the drip factor, divide it by the time you need to deliver it, and that will be your drips per minute. Let's practice that, 600 milliliters times a drip factor of 10 drops per minute. You divide that over 60 minutes or one hour, that equals 100 drops to be delivered in one minute.

04:10 The next dosing calculation is if you need to figure out the milligrams per minute. This can easily be done by taking the dose you need, times it by the drip factor, and divide it by the solution concentration.

04:25 Let's practice that one too. Three milligrams times 30 drops per minute.

04:30 Divide that answer by six, and that will equal 16 drops per minute.

04:39 Always double check your math before administration and on a test. Some quick tips for success, always assess, diagnose, plan, and then implement.

04:51 Always use assessment before action. If two answers feel correct, choose the one that feels the most correct or the best answer. And lastly, opposites attract.

05:03 If two answers are worded very similarly or at complete opposites, the answer is usually in one of those. Good luck.