[IVTeam]

Hi all. I am wondering if any of you use eICU at your facilities. It's a type of telenursing for CCU patients. Our hospital is opening an eICU center and I am wondering what the job entails. The biggest question I want to is if I am in direct patient care doing hands or if I am monitor watching all day. Monitor watching is not for me. Thanks for any input.

[sirI]

Hello, IVTeam,

Check out these threads found in the CCU forum:

http://allnurses.com/forums/f30/eicu...highlight=eICU

http://allnurses.com/forums/f15/eicu...highlight=eICU

http://allnurses.com/forums/f15/eicu...highlight=eICU

[IVTeam]

Thanks for the links; they were a big help.

[sirI]

You are very welcome.

[connyrn]

I ended up loving VISICU, specially working nights it was very helpful. Finish the frustrations of waiting long minutes sometime for 1 hour or... forever for callbacks. Pick up the direct line and ask for rx for blood cx, Tylenol, review EKGs, K replacements, sedations... Our intensivists with VISICU were the best! But I regret to say that Buffalo NY had to let go VISICU due to "bad managemnent", so we were told.

[roamer2]

I am a traveling nurse and have just completed a contract at Swedish Hospital Seattle,Wa. They have an EICU program that is just starting to work. Personally I liked it working nights it is refreshing to have a doctor to talk to who #1 is awake, #2 can actually see not only the monitor but also the patient. and can actually know what is going on. There is some resistance from some of the nurses who take it as criticism when they call with questions about the care the patient is recieving... All in all I think it will benefit the patients and the nurses. By the way I am and experienced ICU nurse of more than 30 years..
We old dogs appreciate new tricks no matter what they say.

[ZASHAGALKA]

I think there will be legal issues involved with this as it proceeds. If you have 2 nurses from different arenas managing a patient, any disagreement is going to yield a decision that can be contested.

Look at it from 2 potential defense questions: 1. Why DIDN'T you do what the eICU nurse suggested? Or, Why DID you do what the eICU nurse suggested, if you had reservations about it?

If there are two potential courses of action being suggested, if you make the wrong choice EITHER by going with your gut or going with the eICU, it will still make you liable. And the issue becomes much more at stake than what a 'prudent' nurse would do. It becomes: what the other nurse would have done.

One good million dollar lawsuit, and the cost of the eICU becomes prohibitive.

In our current legal environment, it's an idea ahead of its time.

~faith,
Timothy.

[sirI]

If there are two potential courses of action being suggested, if you make the wrong choice EITHER by going with your gut or going with the eICU, it will still make you liable. And the issue becomes much more at stake than what a 'prudent' nurse would do. It becomes: what the other nurse would have done.

This logic can be applied to any nursing/medical situation. Not just eICU. Humans as subject to mistakes, period.

Telemedicine has come about to help avert tragic medical/nursing errors. We are going to see other advances in telemedicine that will far outshine the eICU. But, if we rely totally on computer/telemedicine advances and not utilize our own intelligence as a compliment, we will run into even more problems.

There must be a careful balance of the two.

[RYNOBLASTER30]

Originally Posted by ZASHAGALKA

I think there will be legal issues involved with this as it proceeds. If you have 2 nurses from different arenas managing a patient, any disagreement is going to yield a decision that can be contested.

Look at it from 2 potential defense questions: 1. Why DIDN'T you do what the eICU nurse suggested? Or, Why DID you do what the eICU nurse suggested, if you had reservations about it?

If there are two potential courses of action being suggested, if you make the wrong choice EITHER by going with your gut or going with the eICU, it will still make you liable. And the issue becomes much more at stake than what a 'prudent' nurse would do. It becomes: what the other nurse would have done.

One good million dollar lawsuit, and the cost of the eICU becomes prohibitive.

In our current legal environment, it's an idea ahead of its time.

~faith,
Timothy.

I believe that those eICU are staffed with a physician. So if you disagree with the nurse, you could always ask for the MD to step in.

[ZASHAGALKA]

I guess I'm really ambivalent about the idea.

One of the things I LOVE about nursing is my autonomy. I would have a problem with an eICU nurse looking over my shoulder.

On the other hand, it would be a cool job to have working for an eICU.

~faith,
Timothy.