
382 | CHAPTER 22 Informatics Tools to Promote Patient Safety
Thus, the programming error should have been recognized before the infu-
sion was started. However, the nurse had elected to bypass the dose-checking
technology and had used the pump in its standard mode. It was quite fortu-
nate that the patient did not experience adverse bleeding as her aPTT values
were as prolonged as 240 seconds when initially measured and 148 seconds
two hours later (Institute for Safe Medication Practices, 2007, para. 2).
The smart pump used in this scenario was equipped with dose calculation
software that compares the programmed infusion rate to a drug database to