Pt in hospital, sign on door says "Report to Nurse's station before entering room"

[AriesPanda]

Hi!

I hope someone can enlighten me. I

I saw a sign on a hospital door "Report to Nurse's station prior to entering this room." (The room is empty, as the resident is still in the hospital...it's been at least a week.)

My curiosity has the better of me (I am a pre-nursing student); why would a sign like this be posted? I assume this is an infection control issue, would something like c. diff result in such a posting?

Thanks!

Aries

[LoveMyBugs, BSN, CNA, RN]

if the room is private why would anyone need to be going into the room if the patient was in the hospital?

For a room with an actual patient there could be many reasons; infection control, patient doesnt want visitors, nurse wants patient to rest, pt on fluid restrictions RN wants to make sure visitors dont give extra fluids or sneak food in, paitent may need to avoid alleregens and therfore RN wants to make sure that visitors don't bring in flowers............

[AriesPanda]

Thanks for your input! Yes, the room is private, and the patient is in the hospital. The first day (or two) that she was in the hospital her room at the LTC facility was cleaned thoroughly by staff and the windows were all left wide opened (the weather here is no higher then 50 degrees)...the next day the door was closed and the sign was posted. (The patient remains in the hospital.)

I would think if it was just to keep her personal belongings safe it would have been handled like every other hospitalized patients room - the door would be locked and just housekeeping would enter to clean.

My guess is something like c. diff which requires sporicidal cleaning, I did notice the "shared shower room" had bottles of sporicidal disinfectant which I had not noticed prior to this situation (that could just be coincidental).

[loriangel14, RN]

We have those signs at work. Usually it is used if a patient has passed and hasn't been taken to the morgue or the funeral home hasn't picked them up yet.

[Halinja, BSN, RN]

Another reason I can think of is a visitor going in to the room, not knowing that the patient is in the hospital might think that the patient had passed and be distressed. (depending on the mobility of the pt)

When I worked in L&D we had signs like that. It usually meant either the mother was napping, or the mother was so involved in heavy labor that casual visitors were not really wanted.

[SuesquatchRN, BSN, RN]

Whatever sent her to the hospital was contagious and the room needed disinfection. That's all. And no one should be entering while it's empty.

[floatRN]

I have put signs like this up for a number of reasons. The patient has passed away and we don't want an unaware visitor to walk in without being told first, the patient has requested no visitors/only certain visitors allowed, the patient is sleeping and doesn't want to be bothered at that time, the patient is a staff member and all their coworkers stopping by on their breaks is too tiring for the patient etc.

[NP Sam]

When I saw the sign at our facility it was because patient had MRSA.

[Ruby Vee, BSN]

we post those signs in our icu outside the doors of certain patients whose visitors have been known not to comply with visiting rules or the rules of common sense. mrsa patients whose families cannot be bothered with contact precautions, patients in double rooms where the families have been known to walk right in on the roommate using a commode chair or bedpan because "we only have a little time to visit mom", or families who don't get along and have been known to start a ruckus. (knives anyone? guns?) and before you bring up curtains -- ours are a disaster. they get stuck in the track and you cannot pull them open or closed, and if you yank really hard they run all the way off the track and fall on the ground. our manager has been making a valiant effort to solve that problem, but so far no luck.

we also have those signs to stop visitors from just walking into dad's room and being shocked when dad isn't there and another patient is instead. usually because dad was transferred to another icu so we could get our surgeries in, or because dad has developed mrsa and been moved for isolation purposes. i have to admit, though, that i sometimes get a cheap and very evil thrill watching certain obnoxious families just barge into "dad's room" without consideration for dad's roommate and being panic-stricken because dad isn't in there . . . maybe i am an evil person after all . . . .

[imintrouble, BSN, RN]

Sometimes the pt doesn't want visitors. We also use them if legal stuff is going on. Mom doesn't want dad to visit the kids. Restraining order.... that sort of thing. Of course nobody monitors the hallway every minute 24/7. A sign to keep someone out who wants to enter is just a worthless piece of paper. We don't use them for isolation rooms, as we have those signs posted instead.