Question

Marsha is a nurse at a hospital. She draws blood from a patient and then mislabels the tube by using information from another patient. This causes inaccurate reporting of lab results. Marsha recognizes her mistake and tells her supervisor, and then she relabels the blood. Does an incident report need to be filed?
Yes because a mistake was made.
Yes because an injury occurred.
No because no injury or illness was caused.
No because Marsha reported it.

Answer 1

Yes — because a mistake was made.

Any patient‑safety event or near‑miss (including mislabeling or wrong‑patient specimens that produced inaccurate results) should be entered in the facility’s incident/occurrence reporting system. Telling a supervisor is necessary but not a substitute for the formal incident report, which triggers investigation and corrective actions to prevent recurrence.