stupid stupid stupid mistake. Advice on how to handle it?

Nurses Medications

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Well tonight I did something REALLY dumb. I have been working night shifts now and have never really adjusted. I still just feel like I'm at work in the middle of the night when I SHOULD be sleeping! Anyway last night I was particularly exhausted (for no apparent reason, I had slept that day, my body simply will not adjust) And in order to make it easier to waste an IM medications I DILUTED IT and then wasted part. Fortunately, this was for a psych patient and I needed an extra nurse to help make sure I didn't get hit while trying to administer it and he pointed out my mistake. However, the fact that I forgot something as BASIC as "dont dilute IM meds" Is really scary to me. My charge nurse just said she would like me to show her my IM meds before I give them for a while, but I'm expecting I'll get a call from my director about it. Any advice on how I should handle that call? Ugh this is the first thing I've done that's really made me question whether or not I'm in the right career.

Specializes in Peds, Med-Surg, Disaster Nsg, Parish Nsg.

Moved to Nursing and Patient Medications for more response.

When you get the call, Just own it. I wouldn't say anything about night shift, or lack of sleep or anything like that. Managers hear all kinds of excuses like that. I would just say, I did make a mistake, I have been made aware of it, and it will never happen again. I would also add that you assessed the patient after administration of the med.We all make mistakes, and a good supervisor understands that. Nobody is perfect. I actually made a mistake a few weeks ago and my supervisor called me to her office. When I admitted it, you should have seen the look on her face! It was priceless! I think she was expecting some sort of excuse. I could have easily told her that nobody told me where the used o2 tanks go( which they didn't) but instead I just owned it. After the shift, she actually came up to me and thanked me for my honesty! You will be fine!

Thanks that makes me feel better! The med never actually made it to the patient, it got caught, and I made sure to keep my composure and thank the nurse that caught it before coming home and freaking out. Also, since then I've had a pharmacist tell me that diluting an IM med wont change the absorption rate? Which is really the only problem I could imagine with it (other than if it ended up being >2ml) I mean I guess there's never really a situation where you need to dilute it, I was just acting out of habit and grabbed a 5ml syringe (the size I used for most pushes) and wasting what I needed to was easier if I diluted the med first that way. I could have just as easily grabbed a 3ml and avoided that whole situation *sigh* but I digress... I guess you could dilute an IM med if you for some reason had to at some point?

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