A nurse identifies that a patient nearly received the wrong medication, but the error is corrected before administration. What is the most appropriate quality and safety action?

Correct answer: B. Report the near miss according to hospital policy

  • A. Record the event only if the patient is harmed
  • B. Report the near miss according to hospital policy
  • C. Keep the event private to protect the nurse
  • D. Wait for the prescriber to decide whether to report it

Explanation

A near miss should be reported even when no harm occurs because it can reveal a weakness before a patient is injured. Reporting supports system learning and prevention; waiting for harm or blaming an individual does not improve safety.

Submitted by a TestUstad contributor and published by the TestUstad editorial teamLast updated
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About Quality and Patient Safety

Quality and patient safety include standards of care, quality assurance, continuous quality improvement, audits, indicators and patient feedback. The subject also covers medication errors, falls, infections, communication failures, incident reporting, root cause analysis and preventive actions, distinguishing system improvement from assigning blame to an individual.

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