Bedside report in ICU

Specialties Critical

Published

My hospital has just switched to bedside reporting in the icu which everyone besides ER and us has been doing. What I'm finding is that report takes 5 times as long as families ask questions and argue about past medical history and such. I have no problem answering questions but it seems like such a poor timing (ie i could do it during meds) and an invasion of privacy when a patient is sedated/vented. Anyone else's icu do this and are there ways to streamline it?

Bump^

Specializes in ICU/CCU/CVICU.

Yes. We do it and ask that visitors/ families leave from 6:30-8 to give us a change to talk and assess pts. We also do report at a table right outside the door so it's not technically right next to the bed which makes it a little easier and cuts down on the questions during that time. I really like it though because we do go in the room and trace lines an check gtts etc to make sure everything's ok.

My beef is that we did that before. We did a full neuro exam at shift change and introduced ourselves. Now we do a full report and go over orders ect and it all feels like its for customer satisfaction which is great but its killing our actual work flow. The physicians don't even assess the patients!!!!

Specializes in NICU, PICU, PACU.

We have a little note we give families that explains how important report is and that we will be more than happy to answer questions after we are done.

Don't let TJC see you ask families to leave.... One of our units got dinged for that , it is the families "right " to be there and participate.

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