what is your hospital doing about JCAHO to keep hallways clear?

Nurses General Nursing

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I was wondering what other facilities are doing to keep the hallways clear as JCAHO wants. We are keeping everything in one room with no linen carts, BP machines or dirty linen hampers allowed in hall.We have a large unit and this is not easily accesible from all rooms. This is REALLY compromising pt care! You have to go on a field trip just to change one bed. Most of the time it is not a "planned event" when the pt has soiled the bed and you can't be prepared ahead of time. So we are doing alot of walking just to get supplies. Waste of time and everyone is getting even more exhasted at the end of a 12 hr shift.At 6 PM it makes yu think, " do I realy need to change this bed?" or " do I really need to check this pt's BP" when thought of gathering the neccessary stuff is overwhelming. There has got to be a better way and was wondering what other places are doing? We are also not allowed to "stockpile" linen in a pt's room so that is not a solution either. Has the whole world gone mad? Just when we are trying to attract more people to this job we are making it even more difficult to just do basic care!

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Specializes in Neuro ICU, Neuro/Trauma stepdown.

i've known of some equipment (bladder scanners, hampers) to be left in the bathrooms of pt that arent using them.

unfortunately for me i don't cluster my activities very well and spend a lot of time walking in circles.

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Specializes in Nurse Scientist-Research.

Yea, everything gets stashed into an old storage room until Joint Comm. is gone. Don't worry, they'll be gone soon and everything will be back where it belongs.

Oh wait, they are making surprise visits now

right ;)

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Specializes in ICU, telemetry, LTAC.

We didn't stash everything. The dirty linen hampers had to all be on the same side of the hallway. For every hall there was an area that would be "okay" to put the scale, the dynamaps, etc. The exception to the same side rule is the isolation carts that have to go right outside the patient's door. The theory to this is it doesn't have to be a completely empty hallway; it has to be clear enough to evacuate people and/or drive beds down it without having to weave through or run over a bunch of other stuff.

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That is what I was thinking, I don't think JCAHO really wants "clean halls" so much as they want it to be safe for care. I can see where you need to be able to evacuate beds etc, quickly, but don't see where it makes sense to have EVERYTHING put away in rooms and that are not easily accesible for staff. This hinders care bigtime! I think it is a quick fix for the hospital to just keep everything put away so they don't have to spend any money or time trying to find a better way.Just is extremely frustrating for those on the front line just trying to do their job while the managers make unrealistic rules.

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I guess its a never ending battle. My nurse manager generally comes in and starts clearing the halls, she does fuss but in reality I think she realizes that hampers, Bp Machines ect are important to have handy excess to. God love her and we know she only fusses because it is her job to try to enforce rules.

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Specializes in PCT.

Is this a new regulation? All of the sudden we are not allowed to have beds in the hallway of our busy ED. Before we were allowed to have six as long as they were sheeted and on one side of the hallway. Our halls are pretty wide so it is still easy to navigate a bed down the hallway. This new policy will have me searching for a carrier on the floors everytime transport takes someone upstairs. I was told that the beds will be brought back, but with our "now, now, now" mentality they practically want the new patient and old patient passing each other in the doorway. God forbid that stuffy nose waits more than 15 minutes for a room. :uhoh3:

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Specializes in Pediatrics.

At my facility, we just had them in and we now have "parking" and "no parking" signs up. We can have hampers in the hall as long as everything on one side keeping the other side of the hall clear.

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It may not be JCAHO driving this. In my facility it's been like this forever due to the Fire Marshall's directives.

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Specializes in Med Surg, ER, OR.

You certainly don't want to tick off those fire marshals! I think sometimes they can be more upsetting than JCAHO. (if thats even possible)

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