Triage Call Bell?

[Esme12]

This friend of mine posted a picture....her daughter went to the ER last night and posted a picture of this call bell and the question.

Which one do you think they answer first?

[Ruby Vee, BSN]

You're a lucky nurse if you've never had a patient who puts their light on so you can change the channel. Even when a remote is inches away.

I had someone put the call light on to ask me to mute the TV a couple of days ago. The TV "mute" button was right below the "nurse" button.

[Ruby Vee, BSN]

I know the system you are talking about and yes to do track whereabouts and response time. Of course it didn't take long for the nurses to take them off when they left the floor.

Our patient trackers miraculously disappeared within two weeks. Management gave up rather quickly on replacing them, too. Now they have trackers on all the IV pumps instead.

[MrChicagoRN, RN]

I haven't had the pleasure of seeing this yet.. I have a better solution.. Hire more staff / give hours to the staff you have..

unfortunately, more staff isn't always the answer. More than once I've had to stick my head into the back of the nurses station where 2-3 staff were chatting, ignoring the call light, because it wasn't their patient.

[Baubo516, RN]

We have these call lights at my hospital. The rest of the hospital has had them for a while, but my unit JUST got them installed. I think the idea is to save time - if the pain button is pushed, you can talk to the patient on your phone (oh yeah - each staff member has a phone that is connected to the call light system) and ask about their pain and what med they want. The water button is great - you can bring the water with you when you go.

Most of the pts on my unit (Rehab/Skilled) are 65 & older, though, so many of them do not use the call light to its full potential. If they appear confused by it at all, I just instruct them to push the big, red NURSE button if they need anything.

Interestingly, all call lights on my unit are routed first to the nurse's phone (who is primary for that patient) and THEN to the aide's phone. This is going to be a big culture shift for us, as many nurses (especially on day shift) expect CNA's to get call lights and then come get them if they are needed. With this new procedure, the nurse will respond first and if not needed, delegate to the CNA.

Of course, we are used to working WITHOUT the phones, so I will still just go answer a call light when I see that it is on. Nothing annoys me more than people sitting and chatting and ignoring a call light!!!! (Well, few things, anyway.)

[Esme12, ASN, BSN, RN]

unfortunately, more staff isn't always the answer. More than once I've had to stick my head into the back of the nurses station where 2-3 staff were chatting, ignoring the call light, because it wasn't their patient.

Grrrrrrrrr that really grates on my nerves. If you are not profoundly deaf...ANSWER THE LIGHT!

[inchii]

Our call light remote is somewhat similar to that. But whatever they press, we treat it as a regular nurse call.

[tokebi]

unfortunately, more staff isn't always the answer. More than once I've had to stick my head into the back of the nurses station where 2-3 staff were chatting, ignoring the call light, because it wasn't their patient.

This simply does not happen with our system. Whoever answers the call light at the central phone at the station will page the appropriate nurse or aide on their cell phone. No more "it's not my patient" nonsense.

[tokebi]

Interestingly, all call lights on my unit are routed first to the nurse's phone (who is primary for that patient) and THEN to the aide's phone. This is going to be a big culture shift for us, as many nurses (especially on day shift) expect CNA's to get call lights and then come get them if they are needed. With this new procedure, the nurse will respond first and if not needed, delegate to the CNA.

If all calls come to RN's phone regardless, that's ignoring the full potential of those dedicated buttons. Why not have the call directly go to CNA if pt is calling for water or bathroom? It sounds like a lot of time wasted just delegating. My phone would be ringing every minute if we did that on our floor. I already have love/hate relationship with the phone as it is...

[Baubo516, RN]

If all calls come to RN's phone regardless, that's ignoring the full potential of those dedicated buttons. Why not have the call directly go to CNA if pt is calling for water or bathroom? It sounds like a lot of time wasted just delegating. My phone would be ringing every minute if we did that on our floor. I already have love/hate relationship with the phone as it is...

I thought about that when reading some other people's comments. It totally makes sense for a water or bathroom call to go straight to the CNA. I wonder if anyone at my hospital would know how to set that up? I plan to email my unit supervisor about this... she is big on performance improvement types of things! :)

[Esme12, ASN, BSN, RN]

I thought about that when reading some other people's comments. It totally makes sense for a water or bathroom call to go straight to the CNA. I wonder if anyone at my hospital would know how to set that up? I plan to email my unit supervisor about this... she is big on performance improvement types of things! :)

While it is great in theory how do you ensure compliance? To assume that one call light is not as urgent can be an issue if the patient doesn't understand. In my experience patients who want to "misuse" the light will figure pretty quickly how to use the button that gets the nurse.

My frreind in the ED who I got this from (non nurse) was joking about which button to get the fastest service. I quickly let her know that probably wasn't the best idea.

I am just not sure how helpful they would be.

[tokebi]

Maybe it depends on the setting. In ED where patients are often frustrated and tired of waiting, they might tend to misuse the system? It hasn't been an issue on our hem/onc floor at all. After we started the new call system, there was just one patient who kept pressing "pain" button for everything, and it was because she wanted her RN to do everything she needed.

Also, we're pretty good about responding to "toilet" calls because we know if we make them wait, they'll get out of bed by themselves and trigger the bed alarm, which annoys the patient, which then leads to decreased compliance, blah blah... If the CNA is too busy and does not respond after two minutes or so, it will then ring RN's phone. If the RN does not respond either, our unit clerk will try to grab whoever that's available to help. So the system works out pretty well.

[Esme12, ASN, BSN, RN]

I never thought about the setting. I am a LONG time ICU/ED nurse. IN the ICU many didn't use the buttons. IN the Ed they use them incessantly.

Good point.