2010 Nursing ANNUAL v4d - PinnacleHealth

Nursing has played an integral rolein new and ongoing strategies toimprove patient satisfaction.Sepsis Alert ProcessMelanie Duffy, CNS, and Rethea Deveney, PI Specialist, led aninterdisciplinary effort to develop and implement a Sepsis AlertProcess to facilitate early identification and treatment of patientswith sepsis. Goals of the program are 1) rapid identification of theseptic patient, 2) provide aggressive volume resuscitation and 3)antibiotics within 1 hour. The process begins when nurses in theemergency department identify a patient with sepsis and initiate asepsis protocol. Next, the physician is notified, treatment isinitiated and a Sepsis Alert is called. The Rapid Response Nurseresponds to the alert to facilitate transfer to Critical Care. The newprocess has shown improved patient outcomes: door to antibiotictime has decreased from an average of 5 hours to 1 hour and thetime for transfer from the ED to Critical Care has decreased from5.6 hours to 70 minutes.Patient SatisfactionNursing has played an integral role in new and ongoing strategiesto improve patient satisfaction. PinnacleHealth contracted withThe Studer Group ® , a national consulting group specializing inassisting hospitals to succeed in the journey to service excellence.System Strategic Goals have been identified for each of Studer’s sixpillars: People, Service, Quality, Growth, Finance and Community.Several unit-based initiatives that have been implemented toimprove patient satisfaction will be highlighted.Improving the Patient Experience on Main 10Kathleen Kerstetter, RN, MSN, Nurse Manager, Main 10, created aunit-based Patient Experience Committee that has improved patient,family and staff satisfaction. Samantha Kline, RN; Tiffany PolandRN; and Robyn Gleissner, BSN, RN, are members of the committee.Physical therapy sessions and nursing care is scheduled aroundthe patient and family preferences. Registered Nurses and PatientCare Assistants are paired in teams on day shift to improve teamworkand communication. White boards in each patient room are usedto communicate the patient’s pain medication schedule.Improving the Use of Pathfinder in the PACUNurses in the Harrisburg Perianesthesia Unit identified thatPathfinder, an electronic message board, was not being utilizedeffectively resulting in an increase in family complaints. Staff werere-educated on how to properly utilize the Pathfinder. Staffmembers began to make family notification part of their routine inpatient care, they became more aware of length of stay, and theybegan to hear positive feedback from families. Compliance withuse of Pathfinder increased from 33 to 81%.23