Patient Safety and Comfort are our Top Priority

Typically, hospitalized patients ring their call bells for 4 reasons:

• pain/discomfort;
• environment/they need something in their room,
• elimination/help getting to the bathroom, and
• position/they need help getting in a more comfortable position.

Cooley Dickinson nurses are trying to get ahead of the call bells – and help patients feel safer and more comfortable – by implementing a new purposeful rounding program. Nurses now actively assess patients on those four areas listed above when they visit a patient’s bedside.

According to Nursing Director Critical Care Ann LeBrun the nurses are already in a patient’s room whether it is to answer a call bell or to check on them.

“By focusing on 4 key areas – pain, environment, elimination, and position or PEEP – we help patients feel more comfortable and reassured. At the same time, we also get a status on each patient, which was something we had been doing, but it wasn’t as intentional.”

LeBrun says that with purposeful rounding, if someone needs to be re-positioned in bed, “we can help them and give them their medication during that same visit. Before this program, we might have given someone their medication, and then 15 minutes later the patient rang the call bell for assistance using the bathroom.

“This is just a better, more efficient way to provide care,” she added.

If a  patient has left their room for an imaging exam or another reason, the nurse will leave a card on the patient’s bed to let them know the nurse has stopped by. The card lists questions that may help the patient think about what they may want to ask the nurse. (For example, for pain, we ask, do you feel any discomfort? If so, describe).

The Institute of Healthcare Improvement (IHI) endorsed timely hourly rounding as the best way to reduce call lights and fall injuries, and increase both quality of care and patient satisfaction.