I had an incident recently at work. I've was supposed to give
75 mg dose of methadone to a pt which was 8 small 10 mg pills with one cut in half. I ended up giving all 80 mg and later told an another RN during a medication waste that I gave the entire dose and signed me off anyway.
The problem is I didn't waste until about 6 hours later and it raised suspicion the next day and was asked about it a few days later which I confessed about what really happened. My manager told me that we would have an investigatory meeting and to bring my union rep with me.
I'm worried about getting fired but even more worried about having this reported to the BRN. My question is if this would count as something reportable. I'm in California.
This would have been a great time to develop a lax conscious and simply apologize for wasting so late. The mistake was made, time passed, and there was no bad outcome as a result.
By admitting your mistake and cover up at this point, you've managed to drag another nurse to the stake with you.
I hope you come out of this ok, but expect the worst just in case.
Even though you've said it twice, I think you really mean lax "conscience." And I think that the OP has shown that he already has that or he wouldn't have lied about the waste and asked another nurse to lie as well.
My manager gave me a talk and resolved it. They left it at med error but should have reported it a lot sooner. Definitely learned from this.
Time to buy a lottery ticket.
Not that it matters but I'm torn between begrudging you your apparent good fortune and being pleased that someone handled a confession without getting all hateful and trying to destroy you.
Anyway, I hope this has put the fear of zeus into you. You can't be screwing around with what you do with scheduled/controlled substances. If you ever have an aberrant situation with CSs, immediately correct it according to policy.
My manager gave me a talk and resolved it. They left it at med error but should have reported it a lot sooner. Definitely learned from this.
I'm glad this is all it came to, but this was still very bad and you should consider yourself very lucky. With a different manager, you definitely could have had issues with the BON. Don't be surprised if they monitor you more closely now and aren't as forgiving with future errors. In fact, be very careful not to make any more errors for a significant period of time. Of course, the nurse who signed off as witnessing a waste is partially responsible too. Never sign yourself as a witness without actually witnessing the event. Good luck as you move on and learn from this event
Even though you've said it twice, I think you really mean lax "conscience." And I think that the OP has shown that he already has that or he wouldn't have lied about the waste and asked another nurse to lie as well.
You're right. I also tend to write "sorted" when I mean "sordid" ...and a bunch of other wrong things since typing and spell check became common. I do still mean the rest of what I said ...not lax enough.
A med error like accidentally giving 80 mg instead of 75 mg probably wouldn't have been a huge issue. There would probably be a warning of some kind, especially since it was a controlled substance, but that would probably be about the end of it.
Now making that same med error and then falsifying a waste to cover up said med error... that's bad news. Hopefully you learned your lesson.
Horseshoe, BSN, RN
5,879 Posts
Even though you've said it twice, I think you really mean lax "conscience." And I think that the OP has shown that he already has that or he wouldn't have lied about the waste and asked another nurse to lie as well.