Incident report...Whos responsible?

redroses143 · Mar 9, 2012

pls help. any opinion pls. thanks

agldragonRN · Mar 9, 2012

in my ltc facility, if fall happens outside our facility, our policy says we do not write the incident report.

for example, last month my patient fell at an out patient dialysis clinic. the fall was reported to me by my patient and the dialysis did not even inform me. i did my body assessment and i called the dialysis clinic to confirm the fall. the nurse at the clinic told me that yes my patient fell. i was ready to do an incident report but when i informed my supervisor about my pending incident report, she told me i did not have to write one since it happened outside our facility.

i/we still treated the fall like an incident report meaning every shift monitors the patient and chart for 3 days. i also called the primary doctor to inform him of the fall.

what does your facility policy say?

DixieRedHead, ASN, RN · Mar 9, 2012

If it happens on our facility's property, we would write and incident. I would assume that the adult day care would also do one since it was their driver pushing the client.

Documentation never hurts.

If it happened away from our facility and our personnel were not involved, I would chart the client's condition on return and notify the MD.

classicdame, MSN, EdD · Mar 9, 2012

I work in a hospital so that may make a difference, but if the incident involves one of our employees OR is on our property we write an incident report. We are responsbile for making our environment safe.

AnonRNC · Mar 9, 2012

As I understand you situation, the patient fell on the other facility's property/walkway/driveway (so they need to write one), while under the care of your staff person (so you need to write one). As far as incident reports go, more is better. They can always be deemed unfounded.

nurseprnRN, BSN, RN · Mar 9, 2012

i'm not entirely clear on who or what or where after reading your account twice, i think it indicates that the people in the facility where the fall occurred get to write one, and the driver in whose charge the patient was gets to write one. nobody should ever write an incident report describing an incident who wasn't directly involved or observing.

if the nurses at the other facility weren't present and didn't see the fall, they shouldn't be writing one either unless it starts out, "called to front walk by abc cab co driver who states ms jones fell out of chair. ms. jones found on sidewalk by elm street entrance with ... "

you are two steps removed from this, so you don't write it about the fall. you could write one that says, "ms. jones returned from (wherever) by abc cab co, noted to have bruises on... laceration on ..., states that she fell out of wheel chair. evaluation: ... dr. x notified, orders for ... family member mr. jones notified by ... "

Been there,done that, ASN, RN · Mar 9, 2012

Sounds like the driver is employed /contracted by the facility. Therefore ,the resident was in the care of the facility.

What is the policy? Even if it is technically off the grounds, the issue needs to be written up to assure protocol was followed.

Amanda.RN · Mar 9, 2012

Did this happen on your facilitiy grounds/property, and/or is the driver employed/contracted by the facility? If so, it is the facility's responsibility to complete the incident report. If it was off the facility property and didn't happen under the care of a facility employee, it's the driver's company's responsibility to complete an incident report.