Beware of Interrupting your Nurse!

"Distracting an airline pilot during taxi, takeoff or landing could lead to a critical error. Apparently the same is true of nurses who prepare and administer medication to hospital patients. A new study shows that interrupting nurses while they're tending to patients' medication needs increases the chances of error. As the number of distractions increases, so do the number of errors and the risk to patient safety. Experts say the study is the first to show a clear association between interruptions and medication errors."
Johanna I. Westbrook [Professor of Health Informatics, and Director of the Health Informatics Research and Evaluation Unit, University of Sydney, Australia.] did add that not all interruptions are bad. "If you are being given a drug and you do not know what it is for, or you are uncertain about it, you should interrupt and question the nurse," she said.
Read full article from Health Day.