The proper identification of the patients in the healthcare facility is one of the significant initial steps in the care process of the patients. The safety of the resources needs to prevent errors that would inflict serious harm to the patients when incorrectly performed. The errors made in patient identifications remain major medical errors in health facilities. Though the process may seem as simple, the patient identification errors may result in serious harm and injuries to the patients, which may even result in the untimely deaths and distress to the family members of the patients. Other negative effects of the wrong patient identification include creating medical identity theft opportunities, the generation of detrimental health consequences, and the failure of patient data integrity.
The delivery of medical procedures and information to the unintended recipients may cause unnecessary trauma and pain, with adverse effects when the errors are not identified and corrected on time. Several cases have emerged of the confusion of laboratory specimens, operation procedures, and medications administration due to the incorrect labelling of the patients. The similarity of the patients’ names may be one of the major reasons why errors in patient identification are encountered in healthcare facilities. (Choudhury and Vu, 2020). The incorrect naming and labeling of the file records of the patients may be seen as a minor inconvenience. In reality, unwanted outcomes may result, which can jeopardize and compromise the safety of the patients, be taxing to the patients and lead to the rise in high hospital costs through the wastage of time and money resources.
There have been increased efforts to quantify the incidences of the patients’ misidentifications to detect the variable nature and the contributory factors to the errors. A research study conducted in 2016 on patient misidentification indicated that the various hospitals lost more than 17.4 million dollars due to the denial of the insurance claims linked to the patient identification errors. The typical patient identification errors occur for various reasons, such as the similarities in the patients’ names, especially the first names and the proximity of the patient rooms for patients who require similar or close medical procedures. (Choudhury and Vu, 2020) Similar identifiers such as the same age and injuries at similar body regions may also contribute to the patient misidentifications. Additionally, numerous distractions, hospital staff single-handedly handling too many patients may implicate the errors.
Distracted handling of the patients may also result in errors in patient identification even when there are no similarities in the identifiers of the patients. This may be due to the incorrect labeling of the wristbands placed on the patients. The patient identification errors are most common in pediatric patients, infants, and young children who may not be able to identify themselves to the healthcare providers without the assistance of the family members. The unintended patients’ unnecessary medical procedures and tests may be attributed to system concerns. The numerous interruptions in the environmental areas, for instance, the suites for the non-contrast computed tomography, may make it challenging for the healthcare staff to follow the patient identifications properly. (Choudhury and Vu, 2020)
The unclear and inefficient communication in the CT environment and the emergency department may also create a barrier that may compromise the process identification processes. As reported, 11% of the preventable patient misidentifications effects were attributed to the ineffective communication between the departments. Printing the patient bands identifications in centralized locations in the emergency rooms has also been proven to be the source of the patient identification errors due to the lack of clear patient bands demarcation.
To minimize the incidences of patient identification errors, several approaches and measures have been initiated to improve the safety of the patients. Hospitals with the capacity of using and employing staff have been urged to utilize them in place of volunteers who may not be so concerned with the safety of the patients. (Choudhury and Vu, 2020) Additionally, efficient transport services play a key role in improving the safety of the patients through the efficiency of transferring patients from various medical departments. In addition, electronic medical records should be used to flag the patients, for instance, who are already scanned, to minimize these kinds of errors. Bar codes scanners should be utilized to decode the identification wristbands on the patients so that identity confirmation is done before the medical procedures such as operations and surgery are performed.
Moreso, the workflow pre-scanning in the health facility would help include the uninterrupted pauses for the staff members, hence accurately performing the final confirmation process of the medical record numbers, age, and patients’ names. Adequate staffing of the computed tomography suites may help reduce the errors during the busy schedules that may compromise the identification of the patients. (Choudhury and Vu, 2020)The presence of the technologist in the tomography areas to specialize in the images of the CT scan may be of great help to improving the efficiency and safety of the scanning process of the patients.
All of the above mechanisms would help mitigate and reduce the likely distractions resulting in patient identifications errors. Healthcare providers, nonetheless, should remain alert, vigilant and active to ensure that the preventable patient misidentification errors are kept at minimal. Its high time, therefore, for the healthcare providers to accurately focus on taking into account the bottom-line solutions for enhancing and improving the outcomes of the patients.
References
Choudhury, L. S., & Vu, C. T. (2020). Patient Identification Errors: A Systems Challenge.
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