[Research on preparation techniques for drugs administered through catheters by intensive care nursing].

The goals of the research were to assess the pharmaceutical form of medicinal preparations administered through catheters and identify the profile of errors that occur during their preparation. This is a cross-sectional study of an observational nature, conducted in an intensive care unit with a sample of 350 doses of medication prepared by 56 nursing technicians. Data collection occurred in March 2010. The results showed that 92% of the drugs were in the solid form. The errors were divided into two categories for liquid forms: dilution and mixing, and grinding was added as an error possibility for a solid form. The error rates were greater than 40% in all categories. The conclusions are that grinding can compromise the therapeutic effect of coated controlled-release tablets, not diluting syrups may contribute to the obstruction of catheters, and mixing medication during grinding may increase the risk of drug interactions.