Alarms Fatigue: How are you planning to meet this NPSG?

Nurses General Nursing

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TJC made alarms management a national patient safety goal. Also AACN came out with some suggestions to reduce alarms. fatigue.

National Patient Safety Goal on Alarm Management

How is your hospital planning to meet this NPSG? Who is leading the effort biomed or nursing?

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Where are the suggestions to reduce alarm fatigue? Would appreciate reading those, thanks.

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Here is the link: Alarm Management

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Thank you!!

Eta - oh darn I was hoping it was about bed alarms! But still a great read!

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Why would bed alarms be treated any differently? Trying to understand. All of these alarms from IV Pump, to Low Battery on WoW to Fall risk devices contribute to alarm fatigue in my view.

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Why would bed alarms be treated any differently? Trying to understand. All of these alarms from IV Pump to Low Battery on WoW to Fall risk devices contribute to alarm fatigue in my view.[/quote']

It didn't seem like it was talking about bed alarms but ill take another look!

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Specializes in Acute Care Pediatrics.

To meet this, we are currently revamping our ECG monitoring policy. We SOOO over monitor. And I don't know if you have ever seen what a baby on ECG monitors looks like, but it's smack dab identical to VTACH. LOL! So we have huge amounts of monitor fatigue, but hopefully that will change with the new policies.

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PedsRN- Who is sponsor of this project in your hospital? Nursing or Biomed?

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Specializes in Emergency & Trauma/Adult ICU.
To meet this, we are currently revamping our ECG monitoring policy. We SOOO over monitor. And I don't know if you have ever seen what a baby on ECG monitors looks like, but it's smack dab identical to VTACH. LOL! So we have huge amounts of monitor fatigue, but hopefully that will change with the new policies.

Are your monitors not capable of pedi/neonatal settings for rhythm interpretation? Sheesh.

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Specializes in Critical Care, Education.

Why in the world don't manufacturers produce equipment that allows you to customize the alarm sounds??? Wouldn't it be great if you could differentiate "your" alarms from everyone else's? As an ICU nurse - you may just 'tune out' alarms because you think it belongs to someone else's patient or an unimportant function.... but if there was some way for alarms to be customized - Yeah!!

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We are working on this as well, doing a bunch of things. One I can think of off the top of my head is customizing our alarms. For instance if I have a patient that is being treated for a-fib with RVR I'm going to turn off the a-fib alarm and irregular HR alarm on their tele. I already know their rhythm, I've seen the strips, taken the EKG, and, they're being treated. I don't need the alarm to tell me what I already know. Similarly I may turn off some of the low priority alarms like pair PVC, missed beat, multi focal PVC, etc. depending on the patient and the scenario. As long as this is done responsibly I think it's a really good way to cut down on noise pollution.

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Sarakjp- That might be a good solution for you. But on a hospital level with multiple devices (IV, Enteral, Vital....) not to mention dying battery on a WoW, do you think some policy is needed? Maybe what you are doing is a "best practice" and others would benefit from it if it is a policy across hospital. In any case how will demonstrate what you described above to TJC when they come for audit and ask about this NPSG?

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