A Survey to Standardize Intravenous Concentrations in Intensive Care Units

Abstract

We conducted a web-based survey to determine the necessity of standardizing intravenous concentrations in intensive care units (ICUs). We analyzed the responses from 186 medical professionals working in ICUs. Of the survey respondents, 80.1％ have encountered dilution-related medication errors in injectable solutions. A total of 92.5％ of the survey respondents believed that standardization of intravenous concentrations in ICUs is necessary, and 94.6％ believed that the standardizations would reduce the number of dilution-related medication errors. Dexmedetomidine had the highest unification rate (91.1％) out of all the standardized concentrations of injectable drugs within each hospital’s ICU and was significantly higher in semi-closed ICUs than open ICUs in each hospital comparison (P < 0.01). Our survey shows that it is essential to standardize intravenous concentrations to reduce dilution-related medication errors of injectable drugs in the ICUs.