Nursing students’ knowledge regarding human error and patient safety

Abstract

bjective: to identify the knowledge of nursing students, from a private higher education institution, regarding human error and patient safety. Method: cross-sectional study, conducted between May and June 2019, with application of a validated questionnaire in a proportional stratified sample of 135 students registered from the 1st to the 4th years. The analysis was by descriptive and analytical statistics. Results: the students agreed or strongly agreed that making mistakes in the health area is inevitable (n=78;57.8%). The lowest rate of concordant responses was related to the communication of errors to patients and family members (n=45;33.3%). There was a significant difference in the discordant responses of the 4th-year students regarding the institution’s support for the implementation of measures that promoted safe practices (p0.001). Conclusion: the 4th-year students demonstrated to have knowledge higher than the other years, although they need to improve the communication of errors to patients and family members.

Keywords

• conhecimento
• estudantes de enfermagem
• erros médicos
• segurança do paciente
• educação em enfermagem.