need to hear from those who work in telemetry unit

[heartbeat2]

We are about to begin to redesign our telemetry area and would love to hear from those who work this area how theirs are set up. thanks

I work in a hospital with about 300 beds, ONE nurse monitors cardiac patients and the general hospital patients on telemetry. we can monitor up to 48 patients at present. We also have a "dummy" monitor that we watch for ICU,,not alarms on this one...just an extra set of eyes. the cardiac floor do their own strips but we have their alarms and are responsible for them and we do strips also.

We are in the process of redoing our tele room...which is in real need...

we have 2 telemetry systems so we have 3 screens,3 big printers, 3 small printers, 1 fax machine, 1 hospital computer with screen all in an area of about 8x8 feet

with 3 chart racks that don't hold all the charts

we are constantly reaching and twisting

so this is why we are remodleing

the rep from one of the systems said we are killing ourselves doing the "old" running stips and taping them on paper

his system is made to "save" strips and save them to the computer system.

PROBLEM...our computer charting system doesn't accept "waveforms"...hence why we are running strips and taping

we are about to extend our cardiac unit to 20 beds and it's about all one person can do now...we can monitor 48 patients and it's a handfull on dayshift

would love to know where you keep your charts in relation to your screens, printers, fax machines, etc

our lay out left to right, 12 charts on the desk top with one large printer under the desk, our chair facing 3 tele screens with a small printer next to each screen, each screen with it's own keyboard. the phone is in front of the last small printer. to our right is rack that holds 20 charts. next to this is our main computer. behind us is 2 pinters that we have to stand up to get anything off them. below that is the fax machine and another phone line.

the towers to all this is below the desk and on our right with a trash can. we have about 2feet long and 16 inches deep actual work space to do what we do and our leg space is very limted to the towers. I would love to know how other telemetry units are set up. I suggested going to other hospitals and viewing what they are doing, to keep from re-inventing the wheel.

[slinkeecat]

what kind of tele floor..... cardiac or medical/tele where they have a medical issue but require tele monitoring for a (+) cardiac Hx.?... We have a set up...

for both and we are implementing CORE MEASURES.... we have a 3 tier protocol and so we deal w/ tele in 2 ways..... we have a floor dedicated to cardiac, and then a floor deciated to medical tele.....

[slinkeecat]

we have a tele room on each floor w/ the capacity of 30 tele beds to each floor ... we can put a max of 90 people on tele....we have a central tele room w/ everyone that is on the main floor and then each floor has a tele room w/ a tele tech w/ only those pt's monitoring specifically on that flooor.... all nurses are trained in tele and have to take competency tests every 6 months...we have 2 12 lead ekg's that we use to confirm arrythmias that are showing on the monitor and a protocol that we follow (standing orders)

[jessica1983]

I'm on a cardiothoracic surgery unit, and our tele monitors are in the nurse's station. Just three screens (one main and two with the patients rythms) and one printer. No nurse is assigned to monitor them. We print our strips at the begining of our shifts and they are put directly into the chart. We keep an eye on them and an ear out for alarms, but no one sits in front of them all shift. Also, different units have different tele systems. I think our unit's is newer.

Oh, we do confirm arrythmias with a 12 lead.