1. A nurse is conducting a root cause analysis (RCA) of a

medication error that occurred in her unit. She interviews

the staff involved, reviews the incident report, and

examines the medication administration process. What is

the next step in the RCA?

a) Identify the contributing factors and root causes of the

error

b) Develop an action plan to prevent recurrence of the error

c) Implement the action plan and monitor its effectiveness

d) Communicate the findings and recommendations to

stakeholders

Answer: A. The next step in the RCA is to identify the

contributing factors and root causes of the error, which are

the underlying reasons why the error happened. This helps

to understand how to prevent similar errors in the future. B,

C, and D are subsequent steps in the RCA after identifying

the root causes.

2. A nurse is leading a quality improvement (QI) project to

reduce hospital-acquired infections (HAIs) in her unit. She

uses the Plan-Do-Study-Act (PDSA) cycle as a framework

for implementing changes. She has developed a plan to

introduce a new hand hygiene protocol and has tested it on

a small scale. What should she do next in the PDSA cycle?

a) Study the results of the test and compare them to the

baseline data

b) Act on the results of the test and decide whether to

adopt, adapt, or abandon the change

c) Do another test with a larger sample size and longer