Reflection of Clinical Practice 

The aim of this assessment is to: 

– assist the student to develop personal and professional self-awareness about professional practices and
– enable the student to identify and address learning needs relating to professional practice that may require 

further professional development. 

1). The insight gained from the task promotes student self-awareness, facilitating the student to become critically thoughtful about their own readiness for the intensely personal nature of providing clinical care. This task focuses on the core practice – medication administration.
From your Clinical Practice Unit (CPU) sessions, reflect on an event focusing on the administration of medications with reference to the three (3) components below 

1. Your own performance (good or poor) with giving oral medications; 
2. The good practice of another student administering either a subcutaneous or an intramuscular injection (choose one only) and 
3. The poor practice of a student administering either a subcutaneous or an intramuscular injection (choose one only – NB the route must be different to your reflection on good practice in point 

2). State how these three (3) events influenced your own performance with medication administration practice and state what you have learned from these events.

Description

In order to practice drug administration, we were a part of the CPU session and had to follow the OSCA criteria to assess our clinical aptitude and competency under stressful situation (Tiziani, 2013). I was expected to provide oral medication (paracetamol) to Selena Verges, and consider the five rights of drug administration. While, I was aware about the initial rights that is the patient, medication, the route and the reason (Stanley, Philips and Galatzan, 2014); my comprehension of the dosage adjustment was not up to the par. I realize that I should have considered supervision. However, my awareness about the impact on my grades restricted me.

Irrespective of my lack of knowledge, I was aware about my responsibilities towards the patients, and hence, I observed my colleagues. I noticed that one of my classmate Michael was administering Heparin sodium subcutaneously to Cynthia Green. She followed the dosage 5000 units/0.2 mL BD at thigh region. She picked a well-defined fold of skin and held the injection like a dart at 90-degree angle and pushed down on plunger (FDA, 2015). Her technique was standard and her administration was painless for the patient. However, at the time of retraction, her angle shifted slightly and was not the standard 45/90 degree.

Meanwhile, another student (Misha) was supposed to administer an IM dose of Prochlorperazine to Betty Luke. She draws up more than the required dose of the medication in the syringe, and removed all the bubbles from the solution before administering the solution (EMC, 2012). However, she did not administer at the upper outer quadrant of the buttock.

Feeling

I was aware about the scrutiny of my classmates as well as the supervisor throughout the class. I was nervous, since there were some elements of the practice in which I was not confident. Meanwhile, there were classmates who were adept in the skill, which made me further conscious of my actions. I realized the value of guiding parameters set by MIMS for each drug (McKenzie et al. 2016), since it is very important to follow the safety instructions while administering drugs.

(Some parts of the solution has been blurred due to privacy protection policy)