Medication Safety Competence of Undergraduate Nursing Students

Background: Patient medication administration is one of the major responsibilities of the professional nurse. Prelicensure nursing students and new nursing graduates often lack competency to safely administer medications. Method: This was a descriptive comparative design of 98 junior and 90 senior baccalaureate nursing students using the Medication Administration Safety Assessment Tool via observation during simulation. Results: Independent samples t-tests comparing medication safety competency revealed 29.6% of juniors and 14.4% of seniors demonstrated competence on all eight Medication Administration Safety Assessment Tool checklist items. Seniors did not demonstrate greater medication safety competence than juniors on total scores. Conclusions: Study findings can guide undergraduate curriculum planning to improve medication safety competencies in nursing students. Published by Elsevier Inc. on behalf of International Nursing Association for Clinical Simulation and Learning.