Abstract
6591 Background: The medical care of oncological patients is a multidisciplinary task. The nurse is a key member of the team. The aim of this study is to analyze the incidence rate and the type of intravenous chemotherapy prescription errors detected by the nurses in the the ambulatory setting at the IOHM in a 3 months period. Methods: The intravenous chemotherapy treatments (tx) prescribed by the IOHM's staff (14 oncologists and 4 onco-hematologists) between Aug 1, 2008 and Nov 1, 2008, were analyzed. A database was prospectively built with the following variables: attending physician, diagnosis, treatment cycle, drug, dosage, time of perfusion, type of error detected, and potential harm from it. Frequency tables were established for the type of error. The correlation between the rate of errors by prescribing physician and his expertise, weekly hours of work at the institution, number of patients under his care and number of consults were also studied. Results: A total of 5,015 tx administered to 2,492 pt were evaluated (mean of 2.1 tx per pt, range 1–5). The most common cancer diagnoses were breast (20%), colon (16%), lung (10%), and lymphoma (7%). Forty-five medical prescription errors before administration of treatment were found. There were no errors found in the preparation and administration of treatment. Of the 45 errors detected, 18 were related to drug selection (in 2 cases the error could lead to serious complications). Twenty seven errors were related to a dosage mistake (3 cases with serious potential harm). The frequency of medical errors between the attending physicians did not differ statistically (Fisher Exact Test 0.082) and due to the low error rate, none of the other variables could be properly studied. Conclusions: 1. Specialized nursing is a key element in the safety of the patient and the prevention of malpractice, 2. The rate of errors in this population is 0.9% (45 errors out of 5,015) and the rate of potentially serious harm to the patient is 1/1000 tx.; 3) All errors were corrected before drug administration. No significant financial relationships to disclose.
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