A caregiver’s job carries a lot of responsibilities, and one of the most important ones is assisting their clients with medications. During the course of your daily work as a caregiver, you are likely to help a client with this task.
Why Is Medication Assistance Necessary?
While medication saves lives, increases life spans and drastically improves the quality of life for millions of people, it can still be extremely dangerous unless used exactly as prescribed.
According to WHO, medication-related mistakes cause at least one death per day in the United States. Add to that another 1.3 million people who suffer other consequences from medication misuse, and you can see that this is a serious issue.
A lot of people in need of a caregiver are not able to take their own medication consistently as prescribed, which is why a responsible and properly trained caregiver is often tasked with making sure their client takes the correct dosage of their medication on time and in the right way.
How Can You Assist Your Client With Their Medication?
Here are some steps that might make it easier for you as a caregiver to stay on top of your client’s medication needs.
Keep up With Their Medication Schedule
Most medications should be taken at a certain time of day. You should always be aware of your client’s medication schedule and check it regularly because their doctor might change it occasionally. The timing of the medication is very important—some medications can cause problems if they aren’t given at the right time. It can be helpful so set an alarm to remember it’s time for medication.
It’s important to tell your client what you're going to do before you give them the medication. They should also be aware of their schedule.
Needing the assistance of a caregiver can be a very vulnerable position and sometimes people in this situation might feel powerless. Keeping them informed about everything that is happening, especially important personal things like what medications they are taking, is a necessary part of treating them with dignity and respect.
Read the Instructions Carefully
Apart from the time, there might also be other requirements regarding the way a certain medication should be taken. For instance, some medication should only be taken on an empty stomach, or with a certain amount of fluid.
Sometimes the effect of the drug can be greatly changed by a food or drink that they were taken with. This can increase or decrease their effectiveness, or even completely change what they do.
Read the instructions carefully before assisting them with the drug. If you are uncertain about how a certain drug should be taken, it’s always best to check with your client’s doctor or health care team.
Prepare Everything You Need Before You Start
When assisting your client with their medication, always ensure you have prepared everything you need before you start. That might include a glass of water, all medications that should be given, a cloth for wiping or anything else you might need during the process. This will help you avoid any confusion and allow you a quick reaction if there are any problems while you work.
Respect the Common Care Practices
Common care practices that you need to follow every time include:
Identify yourself to your client if you don’t already know each other. This can be especially helpful in assisted care living facilities or adult family homes, where multiple clients and caregivers exist. Don’t forget to tell your client you are about to give them their medication.
Use infection control measures and standard precautions to protect your client and yourself. This always means washing your hands correctly before and after providing care. Depending on the situation and type of medication, you might also need to wear gloves or a mask. If you are not sure what precautions are needed for your client’s medication, you can ask an RN or your client’s healthcare team.
Advocate your client’s social and human needs. Always remember to treat them with patience, kindness and respect. You should always explain what you’re doing, support your client’s choice, and respect their privacy.
Promote your client’s safety and comfort.
Always leave your client with common use items within their reach at the end of care - for instance their call bell, phone, glasses, remote, tissues or a cup of water.
Verify the Five Rights
Before you assist your patient with the medication, you should always verify the five rights. This means checking that it is the correct time, correct route, correct amount, correct medication and the correct person.
You should do this check out loud, at least 3 times during this task. Read from the client’s medication order and the bottle or medication package, all of the rights listed above. Confirm with them out loud what they are taking and how much, at what time, by what route, and that the medication is for the right person.
Check twice before you give your patient the medication and once more when you go to document. This helps the client to know what they are taking, give informed consent, and reduces the chance of errors. Documenting the medication administration is the time for the third and final check.
Again, you should verify all the rights out loud to make sure you are documenting correctly on the right papers, for the right client.
Medication mistakes can have serious consequences, so these steps are extremely important. If you notice any mistakes before the patient has taken the medication, you can correct it before anything happens. If you don’t notice a mistake until after the client has taken the medication, immediately contact the RN or care coordinator for your client so they can take the next steps to keep your client safe.
Take your time, don’t rush, be patient with yourself and your client while assisting with their medications to avoid mistakes and help make this task easier to accomplish together.
Assist, Don’t Administer
When assisting your client, always remember that they have the right to refuse to take their medication. Should this happen, it is your job to document it.
If your client refuses to take their medication, do not force them to take it. Instead, ask about why they don’t want to take it and collect information to add when you document on the chart.
Assisting with medication only means you give the client the medication and they take it themselves. With oral medications, for example, this means you should never move the client’s hand so the pill goes into their mouth, or put the pill directly in their mouth yourself. Simply put the medication in their hand and let them take it from there.
Administration of medications is different from assisting the client to take their medication. Assisting means you provide the medication and allow the client to take it themselves; administration is when you are responsible for making sure the medication gets into the client’s body. This can be putting a pill directly into a client’s mouth, applying cream to their skin, or instilling eye drops in their eyes, for example.
Before you can administer any medications, you must have a certificate for Nurse Delegation training and complete special training with your client’s nurse. Without this special training, you are only allowed to assist the client to take their medications.
When you assist with an oral medication, pour the correct dose into the lid of the bottle, or push it out of a bubble pack into a small cup. Make sure you do not touch the pills yourself without gloves on- some medications can be absorbed through the skin even in tablet form and can cause side effects and harm just from touching it.
Hand the cup or cap to the client with a full glass of fluids. Then watch to make sure they take the medication instead of “pocketing” it into their cheek to spit out later. You should also ask them if they were able to swallow it before you move to the final steps.
Leave Everything in Order
After you see the client has taken their medication, document it on their chart with your initials. Verify the 5 rights again as you are documenting, to make extra sure you did it correctly.
When you are finished, always close the medication container and put it back in the appropriate place. Before you leave, check that your client is comfortable, and that they have all the items they might need nearby.
The important tips here are to keep track of the medication schedule, get everything set up before you begin, verify the 5 rights out loud as you go, and leave the area tidy with your client comfortable. If you can keep these tips in mind when working with medications, both you and your clients will have an easier time with this common task.
Taking medication is a daily reality for most clients in caregiving situations. For some it might be a source of stress, and others need help with it. Your reliable, efficient and patient assistance might make a real difference in terms of their health and their quality of life.
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