Quality assurance: monitors in special care

Special care units need to establish economically feasible and meaningful monitors to evaluate patient care needs. High-cost areas, such as special care, monitor appropriate use of resources in high-risk, high-volume, and problem-prone areas. The monitoring process needs to provide information regarding the quality of care in the special care unit without greatly decreasing time spent by staff in direct patient care. This chapter discusses development of efficient monitoring tools for quality assurance indicators in the special care unit.     

Improving care of HIV-infected patients in the outpatient setting with patient data flow sheets.

Medical management of pediatric/adolescent HIV has become increasingly complex, requiring a multidisciplinary approach to care. Close clinical monitoring is needed to minimize opportunistic infections, initiate appropriate antiretroviral therapy, and ensure optimal health care to the patient. Monitoring should include evaluation of efficacy and side effects of therapy, early detection and treatment of HIV-associated complications, and maintenance of current immunizations. Tracking clinical data in chronically ill patients is a difficult task without an effective monitoring system. A patient data flow sheet was created to assist in planning care and monitoring disease progression by consolidating clinical information into an organized, one-page summary for each patient. One year after the patient data flow sheets were instituted, there was a significant improvement in the consistency of obtaining and monitoring routine HIV labs as well as serologies, and other recommended tests. The flow sheets have increased effectiveness of patient care and have been used to assist with quality assurance monitoring and quality improvement in the clinic setting.     

Creating a patient classification system: one birth center's experience in the triage process

Adequate nurse staffing is crucial to the provision of quality maternity care in the rapidly changing health care market including the triage of obstetric patients. The mandate for cost-efficient services must be balanced by the triage of health team members who are essential to safe and effective operations in the inpatient perinatal setting. The transformation of traditional perinatal units to single-site maternity care centers requires the development of creative staffing designs that permit the expeditious allocation of human resources in a cost-effective manner. Creating an acuity-based patient classification system for a single-site unit is a challenging task. The authors describe the process of creating a patient classification system when a new unit, The Birth Center, was opened at San Francisco General Hospital Medical Center. The unit combined the staff and patient populations of a labor and delivery unit with an antepartum-postpartum-gynecology unit and included a triage room for evaluation of pregnant clients. The two units had different modalities for budget and staffing. An activity study was conducted to determine unit and staff activities. A patient classification system was created for the single-site maternity unit, which allowed for acuity-driven staffing.     

优质护理用于加床患者的护理管理

加床患者明显存在着不同程度的安全隐患,是影响优质护理服务质量及患者满意度的特殊单元_[1]。本文针对2012年4月-2012年12月期间普外科住院的100名加床患者各个流程的薄弱环节,分析原因,找出5项相应的护理对策并组织实施,不仅减少了安全隐患,强化了优质护理服务质量,而且使患者优质护理满意度得到很大提高。     

Quality of Nursing Diagnoses: Evaluation of an Educational Intervention

PURPOSE: To investigate the effects on the quality of nursing diagnostic statements in patient records after education in the nursing process and implementation of new forms for recording. METHODS: Quasi-experimental design. Randomly selected patient records reviewed before and after intervention from one experimental unit (n = 70) and three control units (n = 70). A scale with 14 characteristics pertaining to nursing diagnoses was developed and used together with the instrument (CAT-CH-ING) for record review. FINDINGS: Quality of nursing diagnostic statements improved in the experimental unit, whereas no improvement was found in the control units. Serious flaws in the use of the etiology component were found. CONCLUSION. Nurses must be more concerned with the accuracy and quality of the nursing diagnoses and the etiology component needs to be given special attention. PRACTICE IMPLICATIONS: Education of RNs in nursing diagnostic statements and peer review using standardized evaluation instruments can be means to further enhance RNs' documentation practice.     

Endoscopy unit considerations in the care of obese patients

The dramatic increase in obesity in the general population is accompanied by a concomitant increase in bariatric surgical programs. Gastrointestinal endoscopy has an important role in patient evaluation, postoperative management, and emerging endoscopic bariatric therapies. Endoscopy units must address special design and equipment needs of obese patients in short- and long-range planning. Obese people require more health care resources than nonobese people, with increased physical challenges for staff in administering that care. This article details endoscopy unit considerations pertaining to the bariatric patient, which may apply to pretreatment endoscopic evaluation, managing postoperative bariatric surgical complications, and emerging endoluminal bariatric therapies.     

Best practices in orthopaedic inpatient care

Most patients admitted in the hospital requiring skilled nursing care are at risk for adverse events or complications from their conditions and treatments. They require close observation during their hospital stays, and care providers must be prepared to detect and intervene quickly when complications occur. Orthopaedic patients are a unique surgical patient population in that their underlying physical conditions, operative locations, and comorbidities can place them at higher risk for complications or adverse events than many other surgical patients. Orthopaedic patients are usually admitted to general acute care surgical units where there are no monitoring devices and the staffing ratios are less intense. In the event that a higher level of surveillance is needed, current practice is to transfer the patient to a care area with telemetry or hardwired monitoring capability, which can result in deviation from the orthopaedic care pathway. In this article, we describe the implementation of best care practices that combine lower nurse to patient ratios, innovative and effective patient education, and continuous surveillance using novel technology in an orthopaedic unit. Data demonstrate that this multifaceted approach to high-quality orthopaedic care has contributed to better patient outcomes.     

Home care of the ventilator-dependent person.

Discharge of the ventilator-dependent person from a hospital requires careful advance planning by hospital personnel and rehabilitation of the patient to assure maximal functional ability in the home. The patient and family should be taught the techniques necessary for both routine and emergency care in the home. Respiratory equipment, including the type of mechanical ventilator best suited to the patient's needs and the home environment, and disposable supplies must be obtained, and payment from third-party payers must be assured. Equipment placement and the ability of the patient to perform self-care and activities of daily living following discharge can be facilitated by integrating results of a home care evaluation into the patient's rehabilitation program. Trips of gradually longer duration out of the hospital allow the patient to gain confidence in his ability to care for himself. Responsibilities for follow-up in the home can be shared by respiratory home care companies, visiting nurses, and pulmonary physicians.     

Epidemiology, classification, initial care, and administrative considerations for critically burned patients

The care of major burn injuries is a critical care endeavor from the initial evaluation and admission until the patient is discharged from the burn intensive care unit. A thorough history and physical examination are essential and require expertise to classify each burn injury. The initial treatment of the burn must address stopping the burning process, insuring a patient airway, assessing inhalation injury, initiation of adequate fluid and electrolyte resuscitation, appropriate wound care, and institution of ancillary care, such as insertion of nasogastric tubes and urinary catheters, narcotic dosage, tetanus prophylaxis, laboratory studies, and environmental temperature control. Critical care units must be designed, equipped, and staffed to facilitate the safe and effective care of burned patients. A well trained and experienced multidisciplinary burn team under the direction of a surgeon who specializes in burns is essential to the ultimate outcome of the seriously burned patient. Effective communication among the burn team and with the burned patients requires formal protocols for general treatment as well as dynamic individualized care based on careful comprehensive observations and monitoring. The prognosis for these critically injured and ill patients depends on attention to every detail of their care, which can only be accomplished in a sophisticated critical care atmosphere with personnel skilled in intensive care techniques.     

晨间护理工作流程再造在ICU优质护理中的应用

目的 探讨ICU开展优质护理的晨间护理工作模式.方法 对ICU原有晨间护理工作流程进行再造,比较流程再造前后责任护士对患者病情掌握、危重患者护理质量、医护患满意度及医护人员手卫生依从性的情况.结果 流程再造后责任护士对患者病情掌握、危重患者护理质量、医护患满意度、医护人员手卫生依从性均较再造前明显提高（P＜0.01）.结论 晨间护理工作流程再造有利于优质护理顺利开展.     

Medical accountability

All patient care aspects of prehospital health care delivery must be physician directed. This process of medical accountability seeks to assure quality EMS patient care. Emphasis in this chapter is on the two main configurations of EMS medical accountability, off-line medical direction and on-line medical control. Topics include EMS physician qualifications, responsibilities, and authority; the role of protocols and standing orders; medical control configurations; and others.     

An evaluation of a post-acute rehabilitation unit after five years of operations

IntroductionThe Hospital Organization Guidelines (HOG) recently recommended that Reference Hospitals create Post-Acute Rehabilitation Units (PARU). The authors describe the quality process of a PARU in a University Hospital (UH); this quality process had previously been used in a private rehabilitation hospital.GoalsThe authors wanted to evaluate the organization of the care provided in their PARU and compare the evaluation results with the results expected at the unit's creation five years earlier.MethodsThe evaluation indicators were set when the unit was created. These indicators allowed the evaluation of the appropriateness of admissions, the efficiency of the care path and the response to the patients’ rehabilitation and intensive care needs.ResultsThe appropriateness of admission was found to be coherent with the typology of patients admitted (i.e., brain and spinal cord injured patients just discharged from intensive care units). The brain-injured care path was streamlined. The evaluation results raised several questions about the resources provided and about the different needs of post-acute care and rehabilitation.Discussion and conclusionPatient needs must be identified precisely if the weak links of the care path are to be reinforced. The indicators used must be capable of assessing both the quantity and the quality of care. If these indicators lack relevance, or if the health care organization responds incompletely to patient needs, it puts the efficiency of the whole system at stake.     

Occurrence screening in critical care

Occurrence screening is a system of quality assurance in which patient care is reviewed, both concurrently and retrospectively, against a set of general outcome screening criteria. It is a method for monitoring the quality of clinical practice more comprehensively that has been possible in the past. If implemented appropriately, occurrence screening eliminates the random efforts and audits of past quality assurance efforts with a systematic and comprehensive monitoring process aimed at identifying questionable quality of care practices. This article discusses the concept of occurrence screening as a useful tool in assessing quality of care in a special care unit.     

An empirical test of the Nursing Role Effectiveness Model

AIMS OF THE STUDY: This study investigated the propositions depicted in the Nursing Role Effectiveness Model, in which nurse and patient structural variables were expected to influence nurses' role performance, which, in turn was expected to affect patient outcome achievement. RATIONALE/BACKGROUND: Increasingly, nurses are expected to demonstrate their contribution to patient outcome achievement as a basis for evaluating practice and for monitoring improvements in practice. A model was developed that describes nursing practice in relationship to the roles nurses assume in health care, and links patient and system outcomes to nurses' role functions (Nursing Economics 1998: 16, 58-64, 87). RESEARCH METHODS: A cross-sectional design was used to collect data on the structure, process, and outcome variables. Data were collected through structured questionnaires and chart audit, involving a total of 372 patients and 254 nurses from 26 general medical-surgical units in a tertiary care hospital. Patient structural variables included medical diagnosis, age, gender and education. Nurse structural variables included educational preparation and length of hospital experience. The unit structural variables included the adequacy of time to provide care, autonomy, and role tension. The quality of nurses' independent role performance was assessed by collecting data from patients on their perception of the quality of nursing care. Nurses' interdependent role performance was assessed by collecting data from nurses on the quality of nurse communication and co-ordination of care. Patient outcomes were assessed through self-report and consisted of the patients' therapeutic self-care ability, functional status, and mood disturbance at the time of hospital discharge. Structural equation modelling was used to test the hypothesized relationships among the structural, process, and outcome variables. RESULTS: Patients viewed nurses' independent role performance more effective on units where nurses reported less autonomy but more time to provide care. The quality of nurse communication was higher on units where nurses had higher education, more autonomy, less hospital experience, and lower role tension. However, the co-ordination of care was more effective on units where nurses had higher education, greater hospital experience, less autonomy and role tension. The three role performance variables were associated with patients' therapeutic self-care ability at hospital discharge. Nurses' independent role performance was associated with better patient functional status and less mood disturbance at hospital discharge. The role performance variables fully mediated the effect of the structural variables on patient outcomes, lending support for the proposition that nurses' role performance explains the relationship between structural variables, such as nurse education and autonomy, and patient outcome achievement. DISCUSSION: The Nursing Role Effectiveness Model provides a well-defined conceptual framework to guide the evaluation of outcomes of nursing care. For the most part the hypothesized relationships among the variables were supported. However, further work is needed to develop an understanding of how nurses engage in their co-ordinating role functions and how we can measures these role activities.     

Value-added care: a new way of assessing nursing staffing ratios and workload variability

OBJECTIVE: To thoroughly understand the implications of California regulatory staffing ratios on nursing units, the present study examines the relative amounts of time allocated to workload activities among registered nurses. BACKGROUND: Nursing is a synergistic, intuitive process and may not be capable of being translated into minimum patient-to-nurse ratios that work across an entire region or state. A fundamental step in evaluating the appropriateness of prescribed ratios lies in assessing how registered nurses spend their time while caring for patients. Once workload intensity is assessed, additional factors can be identified to design mandated staffing levels for acute care settings. METHODS: Variability in workload intensity was assessed using the Robert Woods Johnson Foundation "Transforming Care at the Bedside" work flow methodology approach in evaluating value-added care and assessing the amount of time nurses spent on direct care and other categorical activities. RESULTS: The results revealed a marked variation in the medical-surgical unit compared with the 2 telemetry units regarding the amount of time spent by registered nurses on value-added, necessary, and non-value-added activities, as well as variability in the amount of time that registered nurses spent on direct care, indirect care, documentation, waste, and other activities. CONCLUSION: By evaluating patient quality of care in acute care settings, we can return to a basic aspect of how nurses spend their time caring for patients-the activities that not only involve direct care but also benefit the patient.     

Pain management in the intensive care unit

Pain management is an essential component of quality care delivery for the critically ill patient. Because outcomes are difficult to predict in the intensive care unit (ICU), high-quality pain management and palliative therapy should be a goal for every patient. For those patients actively dying, palliation may be among the main benefits offered by the health care team. Appropriate palliation of pain begins with the use of effective strategies for recognizing, evaluating,and monitoring pain. Skill in pain management requires knowledge of both pharmacologic and nonpharmacologic therapies. This article focuses on expertise in the use of opiates to facilitate confident and appropriate pain therapy. To optimize palliative therapy, symptoms are best addressed by interdisciplinary care teams guided by models that acknowledge a continuum of curative therapies and palliative care.     

Quality and safety in the intensive care unit

Ensuring patient safety is becoming increasingly important for intensive care unit practitioners. The intensive care unit is particularly prone to medical errors because of the complexity of the patients, interdependence of the practitioners, and dependence on team functioning. This review provides historical perspectives, research foundations, and a practical "how to" guide to improving care in the intensive care unit. It also considers the organizational structure, the processes of care, and the occurrence of adverse outcomes in this setting. Effective intensive care unit quality and safety programs capitalize on institutional resources and have multidisciplinary input with clear leadership, input from quality improvement initiatives, a responsible yet nonpunitive culture, and data-driven assessment and monitoring to reduce medical errors. Intensive care unit practitioners need to capitalize on the benefits that patients and their families bring to the patient safety discourse. This provides opportunities for better understanding the risks of the intensive care unit and improving the consent process.     

Critical care organization

The organizational structure of critical care services likely affects the quality of patient care, and ultimately, patient outcomes. Based on the available data, the ideal intensive care unit would be a closed-unit staffed by dedicated intensivists. Whether or not around-the-clock intensivist staffing is necessary, however, is debatable. Because financial realities preclude all units from being ideal, alternative strategies for organization must be explored.