Teaching patient safety with a functional electronic medication record.

A profusion of valuable technology is available to provide nursing students with realistic training of fundamental nursing skills. Use of simulation technology to provide medication administration training has been demonstrated to improve safety in the adult and pediatric clinical settings (Pauly-O’Neill, 2009; Sears, Goldsworthy, & Goodman, 2010). In 2012, the Division of Nursing at Bob Jones University incorporated barcode technology, including a functional electronic medication administration record* (eMAR), into the on-campus nursing laboratory. Forty-six sophomore nursing students were taught how to safely give medications when using barcode technology. The students were instructed to practice the fi ve rights of medication administration, and the correct patient identifi cation process was emphasized. This emphasis assisted students to meet the Joint Commission’s top national patient safety goal to identify patients correctly (The Joint Commission, 2012). The use of the functional eMAR also allowed the students to practice expanding the traditional fi ve rights to seven rights (i.e., right reason, right documentation). External resources linked to the eMAR provided the opportunity for students to review medication information that was unfamiliar to them. Students completed their medication practice by charting the medication they administered in the laboratory setting. In addition to increasing patient safety through simulating correct nursing practice, the Division of Nursing anticipated that barcode technology training would also prepare students to administer medications at a quicker pace. Laboratory Set-Up