Handwriting 101

[AngelGirl]

Illegible Handwriting Takes Time Away From Patient Care.

ER is a place like no other. Things happen fast. We respond with equal speed. We run, we jump, we juggle as we jump and run, and somehow we keep it all in the air and in motion.

Then, we grab the next chart. The triage nurse states the complaint of the person is " fry x 8kf w/na riquix' .................huh?

We read through the triage sheet and , with no further clues gleaned, the hunt is on to find the true reason why this person of unknown age or complaint or gender is here to be seen. We either turn to ask another staff member or stop to call the triage nurse. He/she is harried enough working in the Penalty Box all shift and this call only adds to the distress.

Then there are the MD's orders. written as though they were not meant for human eyes to see. If I must stop to decifer an order or even (OH NO!!!) get an order clarified, it interrupts my progress and stops short my momentum.

I suggest 1) WRITE LEGIBLY (duh)

2) ALWAYS PRINT

Care to voice any opinions? stories? cases of defense for harried triage staff?

[ernurse728, LPN]

Excellent plan Kitty cat....I am impressed....and sadly not the least bit surprised!

[AngelGirl]

Great plan, Kitty.

I attended last year's Halloween party for the ED. One of the PAs decided to dress up as the scariest character he could think of. He came as a "JCAHO INSPECTOR" To ER staff and Management, that IS scary!

I believe that unless businesses are hit with threat of loss of money and/ or power, they usually won't deal with a problem. Making this nurse's illegible handwriting THEIR problem instead of yours, veetach, will hopefully bring some relief.

I'm wondering why the "Triage King" is the only inhabitant of The Penalty Box on his shift. Doesn't he transfer out onto the floor from time to time? It seems like an easy solution. The person who assigns positions could assign him to work in another part oif the ER. However, I have the feeling that you've probably tried that angle.

Hope everything works out.

Angel

[kitty=^..^=cat]

I knew we had a problem with illegible MD handwriting, but didn't have enough current examples to really do anything with. I went to staff meetings and started having nursing and pharmacy forward Quality Management copies of every illegible order they could get their hands on. They were skeptical at first and doubted that we would really do anything with this extra paperwork we were asking for, but we stayed focused on getting a true picture of the problem. I trended each physician's illegible writing rate (illegibile orders/patient discharges) to identify the individual problems and went to the meeting "armed".

Now if we could just get the physicians to start spelling out "units" instead of abbreviating it "U", which is going to be a JCAHO hot-button in the next couple of years...