Just-in-Time Evidence-Based E-mail “Reminders” in Home Health Care: Impact on Patient Outcomes

OBJECTIVE: To assess the impact and cost-effectiveness of two information-based provider reminder interventions designed to improve self-care management and outcomes of heart failure (HF) patients. DATA SOURCES/STUDY SETTING: Interview and agency administrative data on 628 home care patients with a primary diagnosis of HF. STUDY DESIGN: Patients were treated by nurses randomly assigned to usual care or one of two intervention groups. The basic intervention was an e-mail to the patient's nurse highlighting six HF-specific clinical recommendations. The augmented intervention supplemented the initial nurse reminder with additional clinician and patient resources. DATA COLLECTION: Patient interviews were conducted 45 days post admission to measure self-management behaviors, HF-specific outcomes (Kansas City Cardiomyopathy Questionnaire-KCCQ), health-related quality of life (EuroQoL), and service use. PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: Both interventions improved the mean KCCQ summary score (15.3 and 12.9 percent, respectively) relative to usual care (p< or =.05). The basic intervention also yielded a higher EuroQoL score relative to usual care (p< or =.05). In addition, the interventions had a positive impact on medication knowledge, diet, and weight monitoring. The basic intervention was more cost-effective than the augmented intervention in improving clinical outcomes. CONCLUSIONS: This study demonstrates the positive impact of targeting evidence-based computer reminders to home health nurses to improve patient self-care behaviors, knowledge, and clinical outcomes. It also advances the field's limited understanding of the cost-effectiveness of selected strategies for translating research into practice.     

The clinical encounter as local moral world: Shifts of assumptions and transformation in relational context

In this study we consider the process of the clinical encounter, and present exemplars of how assumptions of both clinicians and their patients can shift or transform in the course of a diagnostic interview. We examine the process as it is recalled, and further elaborated, in post-diagnostic interviews as part of a collaborative inquiry during reflections with clinicians and patients in the northeastern United States. Rather than treating assumptions by patients and providers as a fixed attribute of an individual, we treat them as occurring between people within a particular social context, the diagnostic interview. We explore the diagnostic interview as a landscape in which assumptions occur (and can shift), navigate the features of this landscape, and suggest that our examination can best be achieved by the systematic comparison of views of the multiple actors in an experience-near manner. We describe what might be gained by this shift in assumptions and how it can make visible what is at stake for clinician and patient in their local moral worlds—for patients, acknowledgment of social suffering, for clinicians how assumptions are a barrier to engagement with minority patients. It is crucial for clinicians to develop this capacity for reflection when navigating the interactions with patients from different cultures, to recognize and transform assumptions, to notice ‘surprises’, and to elicit what really matters to patients in their care.     

用护理工时量化法考核ICU护士的绩效

目的探索一种适合ICU护理工作特点的管理模式，提高管理效应。方法用护理工作量、ICU护理质量标准奖惩考核、职称系数三部分综合考评护理工时，与护士的绩效工资分配直接挂钩。结果护理工时量化法实施后，护理质量考核评分，患者？医生对护理质量满意率显著高于实施前（P〈0．05，P〈0．01）。结论护理工时量化绩效分配克服了经验式管理的弊端，建立了有效的激励机制，体现了多劳多得、优劳优得的分配原则，挖掘了护理人员的自身潜力，提高了护理质量。     

护理干预对2型糖尿病患者康复作用的研究

目的 探讨护理干预在2型糖尿病患康复中的作用。方法 对80例2型糖尿病患，随机分成干预组和对照组，干预组实施全程护理干预，对照组实施常规的治疗护理。结果 干预组血糖控制良好，并发症发生率明显降低。结论 护理干预是2型糖尿病康复治疗的有效方法。     

数据库技术新进展及其在医疗系统中的应用

论述了关系型数据库的革命性贡献与发展中的矛盾,实现医疗系统中的数据管理功能需要解决的问题,以及对临床数据输入系统的需求。     

Integrating Nursing Care into Systems of Care for Children with Emotional and Behavioral Disorders

PROBLEM: Recent developments in providing care to children with emotional and behavioral disorders, especially those with serious emotional disturbance, have included the establishment of systems of care. Guided by a set of principles and values, these systems of care have organized and delivered services to children and families with complex needs. To date, nurses have not had a salient role in systems of care. RESULTS: It is estimated that 20% of American children and adolescents have an emotional or mental disorder. As many as two thirds of these children are not receiving services. Systems of care have been funded to provide services for these children, particularly for the most severely affected. To date, nursing has not had a prominent role in these systems of care. CONCLUSIONS: Based on their knowledge, skills, and holistic approach to care, nurses could better integrate nursing care into systems of care. Possible roles as case managers, primary therapists, in-home interventionists, and in educational programs are suggested.     

When work strain transcends psychological boundaries: an inquiry into the relationship between time pressure,irritation, work–family conflict and psychosomatic complaints

Against the theoretical background of the effort–recovery model and the action regulation theory, the author presents a cross‐sectional questionnaire study testing hypotheses about the relationship between work‐related time pressure, cognitive and emotional irritation, work–family conflict and psychosomatic complaints. Subjects were 576 female home care nurses. Results of a path analysis show that the relation of time pressure and psychosomatic complaints is partially mediated by experiencing a work–family conflict; also the relation of time pressure and work–family conflict is partially mediated by cognitive and emotional irritation. It is argued that cognitive and emotional irritation are fruitful concepts for a more comprehensive understanding of the relationship between work stressors and the development of strain‐based work–family conflict. Implications for the prevention of work–family conflict are outlined. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.