Complicated equipment may be behind self-medication errors

Patient-controlled analgesia (PCA) is an increasingly popular method to provide pain relief. To do this, patients have either an intravenous (IV) or a catheter directly into the spine, which is hooked up to a medication that administers the medication. The patients have a button that they can push to get more medication for pain relief. There is a lock-out system that makes it so a patient can’t overdose.

But while this seems to be a good solution for pain relief, according to the HealthDay article, Self-Dosing Pain Medication Errors Too Common: Study, "Allowing patients to control their own pain medication intravenously is four times more likely to cause the patient harm than other medications, a new study says."

A five-year study, published in the December issue of The Joint Commission Journal on Quality and Patient Safety, found 9500 errors with PCA. And, while the usual rate of medication errors is about 1.5% with traditionally administered medications, it was as high as 6.5% with the PCAs.

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Tags: chronic pain blog, pain blog, self dosing pain medications, PCA, patient controlled analgesia, medication errors