The Importance Of Bedside Report To Improve Handoff Communication

In every profession there are changes that propel how tasks are done; nursing is no stranger to this. One of the biggest changes that have come into nursing’s daily events is how report hand-offs are being done. Gone are the days of taped report that each off going nurse must tape about each patient and the oncoming nurse must listen to. Nurses are now being encouraged to move their report to the bedside, in front of the patient (Trossman, 2007). It is very important to know how this can affect the patient and even the nurse’s schedule. With every change, there are positives and negatives that can finalize the decision to keep or forego

Currently at the hospital I work in does not require bedside reporting in high acuity areas such as the emergency department. The current practice is to first identify the nurse for the assignment you are relieving, which often times can be multiple nurses. This often leads to very brief exchange of patient information so that each nurse can get to the next person and start care or leave for the day. Due to the nature of an emergency department, patient population is extremely diverse yielding reports regarding patients of different ages, diagnoses, and acuity. Couple the diverse nature of clients with the brief interactions between nurses to communicate what is presumed important regarding patient care while attempting to maintain privacy all with the distractions of a busy nursing station and it is likely some piece of information may be missed or overlooked.

Bedside reporting has the primary function of sharing patient information between nurses, as they change shifts. The nurse ending their shift would report all the changes that have occurred in the state of the patient and all measures which have been taken for the respective patient. This information would be transmitted to the nurse commencing her shift, who would then write and further transmit all patient information occurring during their shift, to the nurse coming to replace them.

Traditionally, nursing shift-to-shift reports were organized methods of communication between only the oncoming and leaving nurse, designated to a location such as the central nursing station or nook of a hallway. Shift reports can be considered the foundation of how the day is going to plan out because it introduces the patient, diagnoses, complications, medications, consults, upcoming test and the entire plan of care. These reports are full of complicated and vital information and while set in certain locations that are vulnerable to interruptions, such as the nursing station, medical errors and miscommunication are more likely to be made. The Joint Commission’s 2009 and 2010 National Patient Safety Goals (Joint Commission, 2015) included two patient safety standards, first to encourage patients to be involved in their health care plan and second, to implement a standardized communication process for handoff reports between providers. Soon after in 2013, The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality under the United States Department of Health and Human Services introduced a set of strategies to improve patient engagement along with safety and quality in patient care. Within these strategies the new method of nurse bedside shift report was developed, which suggests nurses to conduct shift-to-shift reports at bedside in the room of each patient, rather than out of the room. The benefits of this new method were

Traditionally nurses delivered clinical information about the patient, the clinical events on their shift and the plan of care to the oncoming shift to ensure continuity of care and to make sure that their colleagues were informed about tasks or instructions that needed to be completed by the next shift. This process had a variety of names; report, handover or handoff. The format was often different from unit to unit. It usually took place in an off stage room or office or at a charting station from away from the

Bedside reporting involves giving information or a report to the oncoming nurse in the presence of a patient. This method gives the patient an opportunity to ask questions and get clarification regarding his or her care. Bedside reporting increases patient satisfaction, quality of healthcare and nurse-to-nurse responsibility. Hospitals need to design a better handoff process that can easily reduce patient risks and increase patients’ involvement in their care. Emergency rooms shift reports usually take place at the nursing station of every patient care area. The departing nurse gives information verbally to the oncoming shift. Therefore,

Historically, a BSR was given verbally at the nursing station with frequent interruptions, taped on the recorder or a written paper report without the patient being involved in their care. As the healthcare industry has become more of a patient-centered, the hospitals are participating in a publicly reported government HCAHPS survey- a composite scale score that measure patient’s hospital experience through a metric satisfaction survey. An effective handoff is critical when transferring any medical information of a patient’s continuity of care from one nurse to another. According to the Health Professions Education: A Bridge to Quality: “all health professionals should be educated to deliver patient-centered care as members of an inter-disciplinary team, emphasizing evidence-based practice, quality improvement approaches, and informatics.” (IOM, 2013). This paper analyzes an overview of nurse’s survey, direct observation on the BSR, a literature summary, nursing challenges and recommendations that might improve patient safety and quality of care.

Nurses must never stop learning and always need to strive to discover better ways to provide care for their patients. One important factor in achieving this goal is involving patients in their own care. This can be established by doing a handoff report at the bedside between nurses. Bedside report has been studied in various settings, and its effectiveness has been proven in the literature. However, more evidence-based research on this topic is needed.

Communication in shift change plays a major role in the nursing practice and role. Appropriate and effective communication is a tool assisting nurses in providing safe, thorough and quality cares about their patients and ensuring there is continued service delivery. Realizing the critical role of their patients and patients’ families in promoting patient safety, nurses need to engage their patients and family members in the whole communication process of exchanging information and planning the care. Nurses need to give their patients chances to participate in the discussion their health conditions, upcoming procedures, medical information, or treatment options. Bedside reporting give nurses opportunities to visualize the physical and psychological needs of their patients. Change of shift reporting is also a situation where the nurses exchange their clinical knowledge, and patients’ condition changes and allow their patients to express their understandings, concerns, and questions. This paper seeks to analyze bedside report and explain its relevance to the nursing practice.

Effective communication during a patient handoff is critical in ensuring patient-care quality and safety and bedside shift reports have been found to increase patient involvement and satisfaction (Wakefield, Ragan, Brandt, and Tregnago, 2012). Bedside shift report is viewed as an opportunity to reduce errors and ensure improved communication between nurses (Gregory, Tan, Tilrico, Edwardson, and Gamm, 2014). Improved communication between nurses can be beneficial for all involved. In response to the Joint Commission’s National Patient Safety Goals, bedside report has been supported as improving patient safety, patient-centered care, and nurse communication as well as reducing medical errors (Gregory, et al., 2014). Ofori-Atta, Biniend, and Chalupka’s (2015) article examines statistics regarding hospital care and shows that according to the Inspector General Office, Health and Human Services

For instance, some of the nurses have argued that bedside reporting at the beginning and end of the shift consumes too much time, and also forces them to disclose private information about the patient in a means in which this information becomes available to other patients in the room. In order to preserve some discretion, nurses might whisper, which would lead to information being lost or misheard (All Nurses). In this setting then, the primary issue to be addressed in the

Verbal communication between the nurses during shift change or simply writing a progress report on the status of the patient does not cater to the needs of the patient, it is a mere communication method that is unreliable and nurse perception of the written report are often molded with bias and does not wholly represent the patient’s holistic health care needs. As dictated by Caruso (2007), “Change of shift signifies a time of carful communication in order to promote patient safety and best practices... [the risk exists of] relaying important information becomes muddled by irrelevant information instead...” (p.17). In essence, implementation of bedside nurse shift report/handover deems to provide the most opportune outcomes and focuses on patient-centered

Connecting with a patients and their family leads to open communication with health care staff. Bedside reporting allows the nurse to visualize the patient and prioritize their daily care. Using bedside handoff decreases adverse events and promotes overall patient safety. This is because the patients and their family have the opportunity during report to clarify and correct any inaccuracies, so errors don’t ever have the chance to strike.

Communication plays a critical role in the healthcare industry. It is a critical part of nurse, as you will be providing viable information to the different individuals. As a nurse one reason that communication is critical is during handoff. “A standardized handoff communication tool is recognized as a Joint Commission patient safety goal to reduce communication errors and improve patient safety” (Taylor, 2015). In recent years, healthcare facility has change the shift report from a report outside the room to a bedside report. A bedside report been established to reduce medical errors, and improve patient safety. Bedside report also incorporates the patient involvement in their own care. Engaging patient in their health care, can lead to

In NURS 415 I chose to review the concept of bedside shift reporting. At the facility I work at the nurses use this type of handoff and I really do believe it makes a difference with our patients. So, for my senior project I would like to choose the topic on how bedside shift reporting can improve both patient satisfaction and safety. There are a multitude of great reasons why a health care facility should implement bedside reporting and I hope to prove to everyone how great this process is. Please let me know what you all think! Also, I attached a copy of my clinical protocol poster from