multimedia in ICU

[Ethekwini]

Hi everyone,

I'm new to allnurses, just joined today!

My name is Ester and I work at a general ICU (40 beds) at a hospital in Eindhoven, the Netherlands (home city of Philips!).

I wanted to ask all of you for your input; at our ICU we're trying to establish new ways to communicate with the family of our patients and to enhance communication between patient and family, using multi-media. I was hoping to exchange ideas and experiences here... for example; is the family of a patient able to make online appointments for a talk with the doctor?

or can family chat with a patient using skype, or can they see them using a webcam?

What are your experiences with this, do you embrace these technologies or do you face difficulties/limitations and if so, what are they?

Looking forward to hearing from you!

Greetings

Ester

[edmia, BSN, RN]

Hi, welcome!

We don't have anything close to what you mention unless a patient brings their own device in. We do provide free wifi.

Skype would be such a great tool in the ICU.

I'm all for it.

Sent from my iPhone using allnurses.com

[Okami_CCRN, BSN, RN]

I work in a 40 bed ICU wing and we have none of the technologies you speak of, I wish we had some like the family making appointments on-line with their loved ones physician to discuss plans of care. I also wish we had one of those buzzer devices that beeps or vibrates when you are allowed to come in to visit the patient. We do have ambient music for patients to help relax which is a very useful tool.

I think Skype could be a very useful took for someone who is AAO x3, but sadly many of our patients are intubated, sedated, and very sick which I think if that image was skyped to a loved one might cause some trauma. However, I am all about multimedia being used in ICU's.