Liability issues

[ayame]

I need some advice about a friend of mine who created a horrible mistake.. First of all, she's has worked as an LVN for almost 35 yrs....Well, yesterday, a DON ordered her to administer flu vaccines to the patients...So she went to the fridge and took them....They were unopened and sealed....Futhermore, she administered them to the patients....After it was done...The DON contacted her and found out the vaccines were EXPIRED...

I'm not a nurse myself, but came to this forum to seek some help...Do you know any nurses who lost their licenses to this type of incident??...She has a clean record and always been on top of her profession...Also, trains nurses too.... Jus to see this type situation breaks my heart....On top of that, she doesnt carry malpractice insurance... I've been reading the forums about this deep pocket theory...So hopefully, it doesnt come to fruition.

thx...

[stillearning]

AYAME -- take a deep breath, and tell your friend to do the same.

First -- did anyone suffer NEGATIVE outcomes from the expired doses?

Second -- what is known about WHO STOCKED THE FRIG? and were there lots of vials in there, some still in-date, some out-of-date?

Third -- is she the ONLY one to whom this action can be traced?

I ask you this because, your friend clearly had the responsibility to fully check the lable on ANY drug she might administer, but she is not the first nurse in history to make this mistake!

Also, if the refrigerator was stocked by a pharmacist (or even the nurse manager, charge nurse, etc.) there may be SHARED liability here.

And, who CHECKS the refrigerator? Is there a policy that indicates it is CLEANED each week (by whom, according to what criteria, etc.)? If that is the case and someone else left out-of-date drug in the refrigerator, there may be some shared responsibility there as well.

Please, don't let your friend panic. She might want to talk to a lawyer (independent of what the facility lawyer may do or say) just to learn her rights and her dangers.

This is not insurmountable, especially if none of the patients was injured. So, again, take a deep breath!

--p

[Mom-n-More]

The best thing to do when a medication error has occurred is to confess to the patients what happened and apologize. Most people just want to hear an "I'm so sorry." If noone was injured, then in the scheme of med errors this wasn't that big of one and people won't sue over it. This is a good opportunity for that agency to check their process, though. Why were expired vaccines in the fridge? Who is supposed to check them and stock them? How did the nurse manage to administer them without checking the expiration date? We have a form to fill out for all vaccines that has a place for the lot # and exp date on it. Was this form not filled out? There are a lot of questions that need to be answered by the agency. I'm sure their quality review team or whatever they call it will be looking at this situation to insure that this doesn't happen again. As for your friend, she's lucky that it wasn't too serious and I'm sure she'll check more carefully next time. I'm sure she can just relax and take a deep breath because the people who she gave the shots to are going to be fine. If no harm was done, then nobody has grounds to sue her for malpractice.