5 Steps for Preventing Opioid Harm to Patients

By Stephanie Uses, PharmD, MJ, JD (Patient Safety Analyst, ECRI Institute), Lynn Razzano, RN, MSN, ONCC (Clinical Nurse Consultant, Physician-Patient Alliance for Health & Safety), and Michael Wong, JD (Executive Director, Physician-Patient Alliance for Health & Safety)

Inadequate monitoring for respiratory depression in patients receiving opioids poses the greatest risk and potentially resulting harm to patients. ECRI Institute recently released the 2016 Top 10 Patient Safety Concerns for Healthcare Organizations and assigned inadequate monitoring its highest risk map of 80:

Characteristics and clinical conditions of patients most at risk of oversedation and respiratory depression
Characteristics and clinical conditions of patients most at risk of oversedation and respiratory depression

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