When the 5 rights go wrong: medication errors from the nursing perspective.

This study describes nurses' perceptions about how and why medication errors occur and their personal experiences with medication errors. A survey was mailed to a random sample of registered nurses. Two hundred and two responded. Of those, 158 (78%) nurses admitted making medication errors and provided details about these errors. This study, by providing the perspective of frontline nurses, contributes to the body of knowledge on medication errors.