Feeling blue

[caz]

Hi all,

I'm feeling pretty rubbish because of pharmacy this evening. I am newly qualified and started my band 6 job in hospital a couple of weeks ago.

It's a busy department, but that suits me.

I am completing my dispensing figures and was dispensing (not checking or screening) an outpatient script and I made a huge error (right drug, right strength in box, but labelled with incorrect strength). The checking pharmacist picked up on it. I am now feeling so gutted and I am so worried about checking and screening, which I am due to start next week.

I'm really not feeling up to being a pharmacist, and I can't drop this feeling foreboding.

I would be grateful for any support/ suggestions from anyone?

Caz

[crit care]

i wouldn't worry about it...we are not imortal! we all make msistakes, could have been worse, could have got out to the patient, or you could have put the wrong drug in the box....

it happens to the best of us, and every time you will feel like that...just need to bounce back and forget about it and use it as a learning experience!!

i'm sure there are [harmacists out there who have made similar or more sinister mistakes than an incorrect label strength

[caz]

Thanks Crit Care.

I'm starting to feel a bit better. I suppose it's just a worry that I'm registered now and instead of someone else checking me, I will be the one doing the checking.

Hopefully I'll sleep tonight!

[Pharmanaut]

Thanks Crit Care.

I'm starting to feel a bit better. I suppose it's just a worry that I'm registered now and instead of someone else checking me, I will be the one doing the checking.

Hopefully I'll sleep tonight!

Is the honest truth that we have all done something like this.
Best thing is to learn from it.
Make up a checking routine for yourself and stick to it no matter who, what or when.

Welcome to pharmacy.

[hibernia]

Is the honest truth that we have all done something like this.
Best thing is to learn from it.

Very true. If nobody ever made mistakes there wouldn't be any error logs.
Ask to have a read of the error log in your workplace. If there aren't far worse mistakes than that in it then people haven't been writing them down because they happen all the time.

The other thing is that when you know your work will be checked you can lose concentration, even without being aware that you are depending on that safety net.

[caz]

Thanks Pharmanaut and Hibernia.

I will do the things you've suggested. I'm pretty sure that I will sleep tonight now, thanks to yours and Crit Care's advice.

[El-loco]

Caz, this sort of thing is going to happen every so often (hopefully not too often) and there's nothing your can do to prevent it completely. Since a one-off dispensing error is a criminal offence (STILL) you should by now understand the strength of feeling to get the law changed. Yes, a pharmacist can go to prison for these sorts of things!

Welcome to your first gut-wrenching, loss-of sleep, God can life please have an un-do button feeling that only a pharmacist understands - your family won't!

I don't need to tell you to remember it - you'll never forget it - but put it behind you. Pretend it didn't happen and carry on regardless. If you let it get to you then you will make more mistakes or head for a breakdown.

We've all been there!

[Defblade]

Much easier to pick up on someone else's mistake than your own - you see what you expect to see sometimes when you did it yourself, not what's actually there.

Which is why we try and have a system where one person dispenses and another one checks.

If you have to work on your own, the Soc's advise is to take a "mental break" IIRC they suggest doing somehting else for 5 minutes then coming back to it. This just isn't possible a lot of the time, so my mental break consists of a deep breath (possibly just mentally ) and telling myself to read it properly on the checking phase. Actually, it's rather like the breath I take just before I raise my target pistol to shoot - clears the mind for doing the task immediately ahead (I'm more accurate with my dispensing then my shooting, BTW )


Also: anyone who syas they've never made a dispensing error is either lying or self-deluded. As you're neither (evidenced by posting here), you'll be OK
........................^^^ I didn't do that on purpose!!

[johnep]

Like the manager who was asked what the policy on errors was. 'Our policy is not to make any errors' was the reply.
johnep

[hibernia]

Like the manager who was asked what the policy on errors was. 'Our policy is not to make any errors' was the reply.
johnep

Reminds me of the head of a large girls school who proudly told the assembled parents that the school hadn't had any cases of bullying in the previous year.
A brave father corrected her. "No, you haven't had any REPORTED cases of bullying."