Nurses (Page 17)

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In: Minnesota Nurses Association, Nurses, Patient Safety, Patient Safety Standards, Unsafe Staffing

Minnesota nurses are staffing the State Fair again to speak to the same people they care for every day.  Patients in Minnesota are at risk, and their safety stands to improve if they’re know how their hospitals are measuring up.  Thanks to the work nurses did during the last legislative session, consumers will have more information before deciding where to go for care, and, once they access that, they’ll see the real situation of safety in hospitals.fair5

Nurses are reminding fairgoers that they already have a website where they can check hospital quality for a number of different outcomes. 
… Read more about: Minnesota State Fair: Safety on a stick  »

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In: Minnesota Nurses Association, Nurses, Nursing, Patient Safety Standards, Unsafe Staffing

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAHospitals are bending over backward to increase their patient satisfaction scores, and, especially now, as it may affect their ability to bill patients.  Hospitals are adding room service, suites, and even “care guides” to help patients meet health and recovery goals.

The answer to patient satisfaction isn’t a new piano in the lobby, it’s right inside each patient’s room.  It’s the nurse.  Nurses say they’re often asked, “can you just sit with me a while?” by a patient.  Or the patient will even ask a nurse who’s charting if he or she can just turn around and face them while they have to also look at the computer. 
… Read more about: Patient satisfaction is easy. Talk to a nurse.  »

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In: Hospitals, Nurses

telescale_imageA new exercise product came out this week.  The Garmin bicycle pedal actually measures the force of each foot as a rider pedals his/her bicycle and relays power, speed, distance, and even calories burned to a computer unit on the handlebars or an enabled smartphone.  The pedal will retail for about $1700 and connect the user to other people in the network, such as coaches, teammates, or competitive friends who can also monitor the workout.

It’s a continuation of a trend of more products coming out that can monitor a person’s health remotely and send the data back to someone else, such as this one made by Cardiocare that allows a patient can step onto a scale and have readings relayed to Essentia St.
… Read more about: Technology is only as good as the nurse behind it  »

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In: Labor Unions, Minnesota Nurses Association, Nurses, Politics

Linda-Hamilton_1

By Linda Hamilton, RN, BSN

It’s a great day for workers. With one fight won at the linen workers union Local 150 and one fight not won, YET. After a strike that lasted only one day the workers who launder our hospital scrubs and linens successfully secured their pensions and restored sick time benefits the management sought to steal from their workers.   President Jean Ross joined MNA leaders as well as Speaker of the Minnesota House Paul Thissen and Minnesota Senator Tom Bakk to rally together with many unions to support the striking LIUNA laborers at Cretex as they also fight for to keep their pension, affordable health care and a safe workplace.
… Read more about: MNA Nurses support LIUNA Local 563 at Cretex Rally  »

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In: Nurses, Standards of Care, Unsafe Staffing

NurseERNext fall, patients will be able to report adverse events in a limited time.  They’ll be able to initiate an investigation with the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality if they feel they were given the wrong medication or suffered a negative patient outcome.  The report will then go to the RAND Corporation and the ECRI Institute, which investigates medical errors.

While originally supportive of the idea, the American Hospital Association touted the empowerment of patients when the idea was originally proposed last year.  Original story is here.

Now that the program is about to begin comes the warning that patients don’t have the background to assess what’s an adverse event and may merely complain when they’re not satisfied. 
… Read more about: What if patients determined an adverse event?  »

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In: Nurses, Nursing, Uncategorized

dangerousoccupations4Nurses won’t be surprised to hear another study that finds health care workers suffer more injuries than in any other sector in the United States.  Nurses know friends and colleagues who have lost work days and income to injuries, some who even had to give up their career of bedside nursing.  The corporate focus on the bottom-line puts more weight on our shoulders, literally, as we are told to “make do” without enough hands or resources to move a patient or perform a procedure.

The proof is in the numbers.  In 2011, injuries to healthcare workers went up 6 percent while construction and agriculture-related injuries actually went down. 
… Read more about: Healthcare workers continue to rank high on injured-on-the-job study  »

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In: Minnesota Nurses Association, Nurses, Patient Safety Standards, Unsafe Staffing

Dear Brett and Judith,
The 20,000 nurses across the state of Minnesota in the United States proudly hail our courageous sisters and brothers of the NSW Nurses and Midwives Association.  You are boldly calling for a solution to the unnecessary risk to patients you witness every day in the 160 hospitals throughout NSW.

We are with you in your strike; we are with you at the table; we are with you in the halls of your government as you demand the ratios the vulnerable patients of Australia deserve.

Carry on, knowing you have the support of colleagues around the world.
… Read more about: Letter to Australia’s nurses  »

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In: Activism, National Nurses United, Nurses

Nurses often take their skills beyond the bedside.  They travel the world showing compassion for the world’s sick and suffering, spreading a single-standard of care for all people, and ensuring a just distribution of life’s basic necessities.  However, saving the world can mean starting with the questions, “where do I go?” and “what can I do that will actually make a difference?”

Nurses can answer those questions in classes offered through the Institute for Women’s Leadership at Rutgers University.  The Global Women’s Health Leadership certificate program was developed with National Nurses United, and enrollment is open for classes in the fall of 2013.
… Read more about: Don’t know how to save the world? Learn here.  »

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In: Hospitals, Nurses, Patient Safety, Patient Safety Standards

Recently, US News & World Report released its “Best Hospitals” list.  What’s interesting is what criteria a national news magazine uses to judge what’s “best.”  Link here.  

The criteria seems to favor reputation versus results.  Note that patient safety only counts five percent toward the total score and ranking.  Of course, many hospitals rank themselves based on patient satisfaction scores.  The patient survey affect hospital quality ranks, which have many variables including when did the patient fill out the survey or what patients filled out the survey.   New parents, for example, are prime targets for a patient survey score.

Kaiser Health News noted the patient satisfaction scores drive hospitals in the story they did about hospital food going gourmet. 
… Read more about: What makes a good hospital? Really.  »

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In: Hospitals, Nurses, Unsafe Staffing

When the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the National Institute on Nursing Research released a study on the effects of nurse staffing in NICUs, it was a unique look into how nurse workloads affect non-adult patient outcomes.  The study was conducted by researchers from the University of Pennsylvania, University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey, Ohio State University, Dartmouth College, and the University of Vermont.  Data was collected at 67 Vermont-Oxford Network hospitals on very-low-birthweight (VLBW) babies hospitalized between 2008 and 2009.  Surveys on nurse staffing levels and patient acuity levels were tracked daily.

The result was not surprising.  The researchers say that staffing below national guidelines by just .1 nurse-per-infant led to a shocking 40% increased risk of infection. 
… Read more about: Nurses not the only ones paying attention to staffing problems  »