have you ever "written up" yourself in an incident report?

[l.rae]

especially when you could have swept it under the carpet.......a short while back, l went into the pt room to give an IM inj. Almost always, l draw up meds in the med area, for some reason, that evening l did it in the pt room....l change needles after l draw up the med, so when l re-capped the firs needle, l laid it on the counter, turns out the cap was loose. Next thing l know, a visitor was stuck with this needle... thankfully it was not contaminated biohazard-wise....pt did not want to see a doc, wasn't upset, and no one else knew....but l wrote it up, didn't feel l had a choice. If anything had come of it later it would have been much worse and the injured could have made false claimes. So l got a "verbal". My NM was great about it but stopped short of commending me for my honesty, which l found dissapointing.

Anyone care to share?:) .........LR

[l.rae]

l meant to post a poll.........oh well, don't know what happened.

[VivaLasViejas, ASN, RN]

I've written myself up too.......I have this thing about honesty, and I will admit it if I make a mistake, even if it earns me a disciplinary action. It's better than having something come back on me later. Thankfully, however, I've only had to do this twice!

[RNonsense]

Sure have...mine have all been the Domino Effect so far...I like to think of incident reports as a learning tool rather than somebody's-gonna-get-crap-for-this launch...

[ThirdWorldGirl]

I've written myself up for my mistakes my thought is that it's better to be honest about it from the start so it doesn't appear you are trying to hide anything because 9 times out of 10 if you think it can be swept under the carpet, there's always going to be somebody looking under it.

[NurseGirlKaren]

Yep.

[duckie]

Not only have I written myself up for what I considered a mistake, which my DON laughed at and threw out but I have written my husband up. You just gotta do what 'cha gotta do!

[RN-PA, RN]

Originally posted by ThirdWorldGirl

I've written myself up for my mistakes my thought is that it's better to be honest about it from the start so it doesn't appear you are trying to hide anything because 9 times out of 10 if you think it can be swept under the carpet, there's always going to be somebody looking under it.

Yes, I have written myself up and this above post sums up my own feelings about incident reports. I don't want a potential problem hanging over my head, too, so I'd rather face things head on. I also see incident reports as a learning tool as RNonsense expressed.

[oceanlover]

They say incident reports point out a problem in the system. Perhaps there is something wrong in the system! (Not necessarily the RN's fault). What if incidents occur on days where the unit is understaffed?

Look at the move towards needleless systems, pyxis, charting sysems, etc.

I turn in incident reports on myself because when I make an error there is a good reason for it.

[baseline]

Incident reports should not be considered puinitive. They are intended to report untoward occurances. And yes, I have written an incident report on myself. Med error.

[mother/babyRN, RN]

Sure. We all make mistakes. I would be less trustful of someone who didn't...Wouldn't you?

[RN always, BSN, RN]

you did the right thing. I have written myself up over a med error. It could have easily like your situation been swept under the rug and no one would have found out. But, I might have lost sleep and also could come back and bite me! Plus it made me feel good about being honest!