Assessment 1 Instructions:

Enhancing Quality and Safety

 

For this assessment, you will develop a 3 page paper that examines a safety quality issue

pertaining to medication administration in a health care setting. You will analyze the issue

and examine potential evidence-based and best-practice solutions from the literature as

well as the role of nurses and other stakeholders in addressing the issue.

Demonstration of Proficiency

By successfully completing this assessment, you will demonstrate your proficiency in the

following course competencies and assessment criteria:

 Competency 1: Analyze the elements of a successful quality improvement initiative.

 Explain evidence-based and best-practice solutions to improve patient safety

focusing on medication administration and reducing costs.

 Competency 2: Analyze factors that lead to patient safety risks.

 Explain factors leading to a specific patient-safety risk focusing on medication

administration.

 

 Competency 4: Explain the nurse’s role in coordinating care to enhance quality and

reduce costs.

 Explain how nurses can help coordinate care to increase patient safety with

medication administration and reduce costs.

 Identify stakeholders with whom nurses would need to coordinate to drive

quality and safety enhancements with medication administration.

 Competency 5: Apply professional, scholarly, evidence-based strategies to

communicate in a manner that supports safe and effective patient care.

 Organize content so ideas flow logically with smooth transitions; contains few

errors in grammar or punctuation, word choice, and spelling.

 Apply APA formatting to in-text citations and references exhibiting nearly

flawless adherence to APA format.

 

Scenario

 

Consider a previous experience or hypothetical situation pertaining to medication errors,

and consider how the error could have been prevented or alleviated with the use of

evidence-based guidelines.

Choose a specific condition of interest surrounding a medication administration safety risk

and incorporate evidence-based strategies to support communication and ensure safe and

effective care.

For this assessment:

 Analyze a current issue or experience in clinical practice surrounding a medication

administration safety risk and identify a quality improvement (QI) initiative in the

health care setting.

Instructions

The purpose of this assessment is to better understand the role of the baccalaureate-

prepared nurse in enhancing quality improvement (QI) measures that address a medication

administration safety risk. This will be within the specific context of patient safety risks at a

health care setting of your choice. You will do this by exploring the professional guidelines

and best practices for improving and maintaining patient safety in health care settings from

organizations such as QSEN and the IOM. Looking through the lens of these professional

best practices to examine the current policies and procedures currently in place at your

chosen organization and the impact on safety measures for patients surrounding

medication administration, you will consider the role of the nurse in driving quality and

safety improvements. You will identify stakeholders in QI improvement and safety

measures as well as consider evidence-based strategies to enhance quality of care and

promote medication administration safety in the context of your chosen health care setting.

Be sure that your plan addresses the following, which corresponds to the grading criteria in

the scoring guide. Please study the scoring guide carefully so that you know what is needed

for a distinguished score.

 Explain factors leading to a specific patient-safety risk focusing on medication

administration.

 Explain evidence-based and best-practice solutions to improve patient safety

focusing on medication administration and reducing costs.

 Explain how nurses can help coordinate care to increase patient safety with

medication administration and reduce costs.

 Identify stakeholders with whom nurses would coordinate to drive safety

enhancements with medication administration.

 

 Communicate using writing that is clear, logical, and professional, with correct

grammar and spelling, using current APA style.

Additional Requirements

 Number of references: Cite a minimum of 4 sources of scholarly or professional

evidence that support your findings and considerations. Resources should be no

more than 5 years old.

 APA formatting: References and citations are formatted according to current APA

style.