Patient Focused Care-PFC

[mel1977]

I work in rehab-stroke, SCI, TBI, etc...and we just started this new way of doing patient care-well, new for us right now, not new for others.

We used to:

have a team leader, usually an RN sometimes an LPN. Then that nurse would Team lead over a group of patients and that group would have nurses aids or techs. Usually you would have a tech with up to 10 patients depending on the hall, same as the nurse. The nurse would do orders, dressing changes etc...The tech everything else with help from the nurse. We also had med nurses and each med nurse gave meds from 10-21 patients depending also on census.

So now:

RN or LPN Team Leader with 8 patients. Then a tech or LPN paired with the RN. If it is a tech then the RN does all team lead duties including meds and assisting with patient care. If an LPN, can do the same or they can split the assignment and each take 4. The other option is if you are an LPN you may have 3-4 patients and you do total patient care-you do all duties but have no tech. And technically, you are not team leading since you are not paired. I am wondering if 8 patients is too much-the purpose was to give our patients more one on one time with the actual licensed staff, but it seems like we just run around all day playing catchup and hoping we get our meds out on time. Don't forget, since we are rehab, we don't have many foleys, our patients have to be up and dressed by 0900 at the latest, can't stay in bed all day, have appointments and get showers-anywhere from independent to carts.

Does this seem much? Oh and we typically do all our own discharges and may have an admission nurse. This is new for us, in the old days they did this but never had more than 4 patients. This is taking a little getting used to.

[dream'n, BSN, RN]

I am wondering if 8 patients is too much-the purpose was to give our patients more one on one time with the actual licensed staff, but it seems like we just run around all day playing catchup and hoping we get our meds out on time. quote]

How typical of administration...instead of hiring more licensed staff, they just shift the few licensed staff they have around for appearances sake hoping they magically mulitple like rabbits.

[mel1977]

that is a new way to put it! Yeah, def less people-for 17 we would have had 1-2 Rns, 2-3 techs and a med nurse.