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Search results for "Nurse Managers"

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Audiovisual

Making health care safer: stopping C. difficile infections.

CDC Vital Signs. March 2012:1-4.

This newsletter article and accompanying set of infographics describes strategies to help patients and health care providers prevent health care–associated infections.

Audiovisual

Empowering Better Nursing Care.

Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.

This photo essay includes interviews with three nurses participating in a nationwide initiative to empower nurses and improve care.

Journal Article > Commentary

Using OrgAhead, a computational modeling program, to improve patient care unit safety and quality outcomes.

Effken JA, Brewer BB, Patil A, Lamb GS, Verran JA, Carley K. Int J Med Inform. 2005;74:605-613.

The authors describe their experience using a computerized model to understand the impact of organizational, patient unit, and patient characteristics on safety and quality. This study was supported with a grant from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ).

Journal Article > Commentary

Antimicrobial stewardship and patient safety.

Zukowski CM. AORN J. 2016;104:354-356.

Antimicrobial stewardship has been highlighted as a strategy to improve antibiotic use in order to reduce hospital-acquired infections. This commentary discusses antimicrobial stewardship teams, their impact in the surgical setting, and the role of nurses in ensuring appropriate use of antibiotics.

Journal Article > Study

Organisational strategies to implement hospital pressure ulcer prevention programmes: findings from a national survey.

Soban LM, Kim L, Yuan AH, Miltner RS. J Nurs Manag. 2016 Aug 4; [Epub ahead of print].

Hospital-acquired pressure ulcers are considered a never event and can result in loss of payment to hospitals. In this study, researchers surveyed chief nursing officers across Veterans Health Administration acute care hospitals to better understand how organizational strategies are operationalized with regard to implementing pressure ulcer prevention programs. They found that such strategies were not operationalized in a uniform manner across the hospitals and that nurse leadership played a substantial role in influencing the implementation of pressure ulcer prevention initiatives.

Journal Article > Study

A 'busy day' effect on perinatal complications of delivery on weekends: a retrospective cohort study.

Snowden JM, Kozhimannil KB, Muoto I, Caughey AB, McConnell KJ. BMJ Qual Saf. 2017;26:e1.

This study found that perinatal complications of childbirth, including low Apgar scores, neonatal seizures, and postpartum hemorrhage, were more prevalent during the weekend, echoing the weekend effect in other health settings. Higher patient volume was also associated with worse outcomes, consistent with prior studies of nurse staffing ratios. These results argue for staffing changes to ensure safety at busy times and outside usual business hours.

Journal Article > Commentary

Incorporating quality and safety values into a CLABSI simulation experience.

Liebrecht CM, Lieb MC. Nurs Forum. 2017;52:118-123.

Simulation has been promoted as a way to teach nurses about potential errors in their practice. This commentary describes the development of a program to help nurses recognize and correct weaknesses in their care processes that increase risk of central line–associated bloodstream infection.

Journal Article > Review

Safety risks associated with physical interactions between patients and caregivers during treatment and care delivery in home care settings: a systematic review.

Hignett S, Edmunds Otter M, Keen C. Int J Nurs Stud. 2016;59:1-14.

Adverse events are thought to be common in patients receiving home health care. This systematic review defined home care safety risks for both patients and caregivers, including awkward working positions, social distractions, abuse and violence, and other issues that are relatively unique to this care setting.

Special or Theme Issue

Special Issue on Falls.

Rehabil Nurs. 2016;41:1-59.

Safety challenges in residential care facilities are well documented. Articles in this special issue explore falls in rehabilitation settings, including nurses' role in managing fall risks and strategies to prevent falls.

Journal Article > Study

6-PACK programme to decrease fall injuries in acute hospitals: cluster randomised controlled trial.

  • Classic

Barker AL, Morello RT, Wolfe R, et al. BMJ. 2016;352:h6781.

Falls in hospitalized patients are a common source of preventable harm, and the incident is considered a never event when it results in serious injury. Conducted at six Australian hospitals, this cluster randomized controlled trial sought to evaluate the effectiveness of a bundled intervention on the incidence of falls on adult wards. The bundle included assessing patients' risk for falling along with several widely used tactics to prevent falls. Despite successful implementation of the fall prevention bundle, falls occurred just as frequently on intervention wards as control wards. This study is an important example of the need to rigorously evaluate safety interventions, even those that have high face validity. The authors conclude that since these interventions appear ineffective. Organizations should consider disinvestment in these practices because completing ineffective interventions consumes a significant amount of staff time and effort. A WebM&M commentary discussed a case involving a fall resulting in injury.

Journal Article > Study

Reductions in sepsis mortality and costs after design and implementation of a nurse-based early recognition and response program.

Jones SL, Ashton CM, Kiehne L, et al. Jt Comm J Qual Patient Saf. 2015;41:483-491.

A protocolized early warning system to improve sepsis recognition and management was associated with a decrease in sepsis-related inpatient mortality. The protocol emphasized early recognition by nurses and escalation of care by a nurse practitioner when indicated. An AHRQ WebM&M commentary describes common errors in the early management of sepsis.

Journal Article > Study

Using multidisciplinary rounds to improve patient safety through venous thromboembolism prevention awareness.

Karasin B, Maund C. Jt Comm J Qual Patient Saf. 2015;41:428-431.

This study describes the use of multidisciplinary rounds to enhance venous thromboembolism prevention, an important patient safety target. Nurses reported on standardized questions during the review of each patient, analogous to a checklist, and gaps in prevention were reported back to physicians to rectify them. This approach is a team-based model to enhance inpatient safety and merits study of clinical outcomes.

Journal Article > Commentary

Reducing falls with a safety spotter program.

Primmer P, Borenstein KK, Downing MT, et al. Nursing. 2015;45:16-19.

Patients at high risk for falls can be targeted for personalized prevention interventions, but such efforts can be costly for hospitals. This commentary describes how a hospital employed "spotters" to watch and interact with patients at risk for falls, with one spotter assigned to monitor up to four patients, and found the results to be affordable and effective.

Special or Theme Issue

Infection Prevention.

Allen G, ed. AORN J. 2015;101:505-596.

A primary concern in the perioperative setting is the prevention of health care–associated infections, particularly surgical site infections. Articles in this special issue explore strategies to reduce risk of infection in the perioperative environment, with discussions focusing on human factors principles, instrument sterilization, and specimen management.

Tools/Toolkit > Multi-use Website

ANA CAUTI Prevention Tool.

Silver Spring, MD: American Nurses Association; 2015.

Nurses play an important role in reducing catheter–associated urinary tract infections (CAUTIs). This toolkit, developed as a Partnership for Patients strategy, focuses on promoting nursing behaviors to prevent CAUTIs including decreasing catheter use and improving catheter maintenance.

Book/Report

Patient Safety in Dialysis Access.

Widmer MK, Malik J, eds. Contrib Nephrol. 2015;184:1-270. ISBN: 9783318027051.

Patients with chronic kidney failure are at high risk for adverse events from treatment errors. This publication raises awareness of safety in end-stage renal disease care, explores factors specific to this setting that contribute to failure, and describes techniques for clinicians to reduce risk of errors.

Journal Article > Study

The impact of time at work and time off from work on rule compliance: the case of hand hygiene in health care.

  • Classic

Dai H, Milkman KL, Hofmann DA, Staats BR. J Appl Psychol. 2015;100:846-862.

This large observational study demonstrated that hand hygiene compliance rates decrease over the course of a normal work shift. During the first hour of work, average compliance rates were approximately 43%. This dropped to 35% for the last hour of a 12-hour shift. In addition, more intense work shifts were associated with even bigger hand hygiene compliance drop-offs. The authors extrapolate these results to estimate that this compliance decrement could produce an additional 600,000 infections per year in the United States, resulting in up to 35,000 unnecessary deaths and $12.5 billion in excess costs. More time off between shifts led to better compliance rates during a subsequent shift. In this sample, 65% of the caregivers were nurses, and only 4% were physicians. Longer nursing shifts have previously been linked to other patient safety hazards. A prior AHRQ WebM&M commentary discussed challenges related to nursing staffing.

Journal Article > Study

Do clinicians know which of their patients have central venous catheters?: A multicenter observational study.

Chopra V, Govindan S, Kuhn L, et al. Ann Intern Med. 2014;161:562-567.

Catheter-associated infections are common, and largely preventable, adverse events. Though incidence of these events has declined due to intensive safety efforts, one factor contributing to intravenous catheter infections is the failure to remove unnecessary central venous catheters (CVCs). This study sought to determine whether inpatient physicians know which of their patients have CVCs in place by comparing physician response to direct observation of each patient. Physicians were unaware of CVCs in about 20% of the cases examined. Trainee physicians were more likely to be aware of a CVC than teaching attending physicians or hospitalists, and critical care physicians were more likely to know about a CVC than general medicine physicians. These findings suggest that interventions to reduce CVC-associated infections should address clinician awareness of CVCs. An AHRQ WebM&M commentary discusses best practices for removing CVCs.

Journal Article > Study

The occurrence of adverse events potentially attributable to nursing care in medical units: cross sectional record review.

D'Amour D, Dubois CA, Tchouaket É, Clarke S, Blais R. Int J Nurs Stud. 2014;51:882-891.

Accurately detecting safety events remains challenging, and health care organizations are still struggling to determine the incidence of adverse outcomes associated with nursing care. This study used chart reviews to identify the rates of six adverse events considered to be directly related to nursing care: pressure sores, falls, medication administration errors, pneumonia, urinary infections, and inappropriate use of restraints. One in seven hospitalized adults experienced at least one of these adverse events.

Journal Article > Study

Patient-as-observer approach: an alternative method for hand hygiene auditing in an ambulatory care setting.

Le-Abuyen S, Ng J, Kim S, et al. Am J Infect Control. 2014;42:439-442.

In this quality improvement study, patients were asked to report on their physician's hand hygiene practice, and mirroring results of prior studies, most patients were willing to participate and rated their physicians highly. Patient reports and nurse observations regarding hand hygiene compliance corresponded 87% of the time, leading the authors to conclude that engaging patients in this role is a feasible method to promote compliance.

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