WebM&M: Case Studies

This WebM&M describes an adverse event due to mislabeling or “syringe swap” in a preoperative patient. The commentary outlines several recommendations and safeguards to ensure that medications administration is safe.

A 78-year-old woman with macular degeneration presented for a pars plana vitrectomy (PPV) under monitored anesthesia care (MAC) with an eye block. At this particular hospital, eye cases under MAC are typically performed with an eye block by the surgeon after the anesthesiologist has administered some short-acting sedation, commonly with remifentanil. On this day, there was a shortage of premixed remifentanil and the resident – who was unfamiliar with the process of drug dilution – incorrectly diluted the remifentanil solution. Shortly after receiving sedation, the patient became unresponsive, and a code was called. The commentary addresses the challenges of drug dilution and strategies to reduce dilutional errors and prioritize patient safety.

This case describes multiple emergency department (ED) encounters and hospitalizations experienced by a middle-aged woman with sickle cell crisis and a past history of multiple, long admissions related to her sickle cell disease. The multiple encounters highlight the challenges of opioid prescribing for patients with chronic, non-cancer pain. The commentary discusses the limitations of prescription drug monitoring program (PDMP) data for patients with chronic pain, challenges in opioid dose conversions, and increasing patient safety through safe medication prescribing and thorough medication reconciliation.

A 71-year-old frail, non-ambulatory woman presented to the emergency department with fever, sweating and dry cough. Her work-up included non-specific evidence of infection but two negative COVID-19 tests. No source of infection was identified, and she was discharged home after three days. During a video visit with her primary care provider the next day, the patient noted worsening symptoms as well as a skin breakdown on her “backside”; however, no rectal or genital exams were completed during her inpatient stay and the physician did not visualize the area during the video visit. The patient was readmitted to the hospital two days later in septic shock due to a necrotizing soft tissue infection related to a perirectal abscess. The commentary discusses the need for a broad differential diagnosis in seriously ill patients, the influence of diagnostic biases during a pandemic, and how to address perceived limitations in the ability to examine patients in the setting of virtual care.

A 14-year-old girl with type 1 diabetes (T1D) was admitted to the hospital after two weeks of heavy menstrual bleeding as well as blurred vision, headache and left arm numbness. MRI revealed an acute right middle cerebral artery (MCA) infarct. Further evaluation led to a diagnosis of antiphospholipid syndrome. The patient was persistently hyperglycemic despite glycemic management using her home insulin pump and continuous glucose monitor. Over the course of her hospitalization, her upper extremity symptoms worsened, and she developed upper extremity, chest, and facial paresthesia. Imaging studies revealed new right MCA territory infarcts as well as splenic and bilateral infarcts. The case describes how suboptimal inpatient management of diabetes technology contributed to persistent hyperglycemia in the setting of an acute infarction. The commentary discusses best practices for optimizing patient safety when managing hospitalized patients on home insulin pumps. 

This case involves a 65-year-old woman with ongoing nausea and vomiting after an uncomplicated hernia repair who was mistakenly prescribed topiramate (brand name Topamax, an anticonvulsant and nerve pain medication) instead of trimethobenzamide (brand name Tigan, an antiemetic) by the outpatient pharmacy. The commentary uses the Swiss Cheese Model to discuss the safety challenges of “look-alike, sound-alike” (LASA) medications, the importance of phyiscians employing “soft” skills during medication dispensing, and how medication administration errors can occur in outpatient pharmacy settings, despite multiple opportunities for cross-verification. 

A 52-year-old woman with a known history of coronary artery disease and ischemic cardiomyopathy was admitted for presumed community-acquired pneumonia. The inpatient medicine team obtained a “curbside” cardiology consultation which concluded that the worsening left ventricular systolic functioning was in the setting of acute pulmonary edema. Two months post-discharge, a nuclear stress test was suggestive of infarction and a subsequent catheterization showed a 100% occlusion. The commentary discusses cardiovascular-related diagnostic errors affecting women and the advantages, pitfalls and best practices for curbside consultations in acute care settings.

A patient was mistakenly administered intravenous fentanyl which was leftover from a previous patient and not immediately wasted. Experts recommend the best practice for the safe disposal, or “waste”, of medications in the surgical setting is to either waste any leftover product immediately after administration or to fully document all waste at the end of the case.This commentary discusses the policies and procedures addressing wasting of medication by anesthesiologists, approaches to reduce medication administration errors, and the importance identifying process gaps that could lead to potential diversion.  

A male patient with history of femoral bypasses underwent thrombolysis and thrombectomy for a popliteal artery occlusion. An error in the discharge education materials resulted in the patient taking incorrect doses of rivaroxaban post-discharge, resulting in a readmission for recurrent right popliteal and posterior tibial occlusion. The commentary discusses the challenges associated with prescribing direct-action oral anticoagulants (DOACs) and how computerized clinical decision support tools can promote adherence to guideline recommendations and mitigate the risk of error, and how tools such as standardized teaching materials and teach-back can support patient understanding of medication-related instructions.

A 74-year-old male with a history of hypertension, hyperlipidemia, paroxysmal atrial fibrillation, coronary artery disease, congestive heart failure with an EF of 45%, stage I chronic kidney disease and gout presented for a total hip replacement. He had multiple home medications and was also on Warfarin, which was held appropriately prior to the surgery.  A Type and Cross for blood request was sent along with baseline labs; however, there was a mislabeling error on one of the samples causing a delay in the blood getting to the operating room resulting in the medical team initiating a massive transfusion protocol when the patient became hypotensive.

A 55-year-old man visited his oncologist for a follow-up appointment after completing chemotherapy and reported feeling well with his abdominal and bony pain well controlled with opioid therapy.  At the end of the visit, his oncologist reordered his pain medication and, due to a best practice alert, also prescribed naloxone but failed to provide any instruction on its use. Later that day, the patient took the naloxone along with his opioid pain medication and within a minute experienced severe abdominal and bony pain, requiring admission to the emergency department.

Following resection of colorectal cancer, a hospitalized elderly man experienced a pulmonary embolism, which was treated with rivaroxaban. Upon discharge home, he received two separate prescriptions for rivaroxaban (per protocol): one for 15 mg twice daily for 10 days, and then 20 mg daily after that. Ten days later, the patient's wife returned to the pharmacy requesting a refill. On re-reviewing the medications with her, the pharmacist discovered the patient had been taking both prescriptions (a total daily dose of 50 mg daily). This overdose placed him at very high risk for bleeding complications.

An elderly man admitted for agitation and suicidal ideation was prescribed clozapine by psychiatry. The clozapine Risk Evaluation and Mitigation Strategy (REMS) program requires both prescribers and patients to be registered in an online database. A REMS-registered attending psychiatrist entered the initial order (12.5 mg). During the hospitalization, the medicine intern, who was not registered with the REMS program, titrated the dose to 25 mg daily and also wrote the discharge prescription. The outpatient pharmacist noted the intern was not registered and contacted the attending psychiatrist, who wrote a new prescription. The patient's family was unable to pick up the prescription for 3 days. During this gap in therapy, the patient experienced recurrence of paranoia and required readmission to the hospital.

During a primary care visit, a woman with morbid obesity, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, hypertension, heart failure, and diabetes mellitus complained of worsening lower extremity edema over the past few weeks. Her physician prescribed a thiazide diuretic. The patient presented to the emergency department (ED) 10 days later with 3 days of drowsiness and confusion. Laboratory results revealed severe hyponatremia and hypokalemia. She had a seizure in the ED and was admitted to the intensive care unit. Both the critical care provider and a nephrologist felt the diuretic had caused the electrolyte abnormalities.

During surgery for a forearm fracture, a woman experienced a drop in heart rate to below 50 beats per minute. As the consultant anesthesiologist had stepped out to care for another patient, the resident asked the technician to draw up atropine for the patient. When the technician returned with an unlabeled syringe without the medication vial, the resident was reluctant to administer the medication, but did so without a double check after the technician insisted it was atropine. Over the next few minutes, the patient's blood pressure spiked to 250/135 mm Hg.

Transferred to the emergency department from the transfusion center after becoming unresponsive and hypotensive, an elderly man with signs of sepsis is given incomplete and delayed antimicrobial coverage due to a history of penicillin allergy. Neither gram-negative nor anaerobic coverage were provided until several hours later, and the patient developed septic shock.

Seen in the emergency department, a man with insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus had not taken insulin for 3 days. His blood glucose levels were in the 800s with an anion-gap acidosis and positive beta hydroxybutyrate. While awaiting an ICU bed for treatment of diabetic ketoacidosis, the patient received fluids, an insulin drip was started, and blood glucose levels were monitored hourly. When lab results showed he was improving, the team decided to convert his insulin drip to subcutaneous long-acting insulin. However, both the intern and the resident ordered 50 units of insulin, and the patient received both doses—causing his blood glucose level to dip into the 30s.

To transfer a man with possible sepsis to a hospital with subspecialty and critical care, a physician was unaware of a formal protocol and called a colleague at the academic medical center. The colleague secured a bed, and the patient was sent over. However, neither clinical data nor the details of the patient's current condition were transmitted to the hospital's transfer center, and the receiving physician booked a general ward bed rather than an ICU bed. When the patient arrived, his mentation was altered and breathing was rapid. The nurse called the rapid response team, but the patient went into cardiac arrest.

Following urgent catheter-directed thrombolysis to relieve acute limb ischemia caused by thrombosis of her left superficial femoral artery, an elderly woman was admitted to the ICU. While ordering a heparin drip, the resident was unaware that the EHR order set had undergone significant changes and inadvertently ordered too low a heparin dose. Although the pharmacist and bedside nurse noticed the low dose, they assumed the resident selected the dose purposefully. Because the patient was inadequately anticoagulated, she developed extensive thrombosis associated with the catheter and sheath site, requiring surgical intervention for critical limb ischemia (including amputation of the contralateral leg above the knee).

Early in the academic year, interns were on their first day of a rotation caring for an elderly man hospitalized for a stroke, who had developed aspiration pneumonia and hypernatremia. When the primary intern signed out to the cross-cover intern, he asked her to check the patient's sodium level and replete the patient with IV fluids if needed. Although the cross-covering intern asked for more clarification, the intern signing out assured her the printed, written signout had all the information needed. Later that evening, the patient's sodium returned at a level above which the written signout stated to administer IV fluids, and after reviewing the plan with the supervising resident, the intern ordered them. The next morning the primary team was surprised, stating that the plan had been to give fluids only if the patient was definitely hypernatremic. Confused, the cross-cover intern pointed out the written signout instructions. On further review, the primary intern realized he had printed out the previous day's signout, which had not been updated with the new plan.