Relationship of actual response time to call lights and patient satisfaction at 4 US hospitals

Impact of Inpatient Unit Design Features on Overall Patient Experience and Perceived Room-Level Call Button Response

This study explores the relationship between inpatient unit design and patient experience and how spatial features and visibility impact patients' perception of staff responsiveness. The first part of this study is a retrospective pre-post and cross-sectional study evaluating the impacts of unit design on patient experience at the unit level. This study compares patient experiences based on Press Ganey and HCAHPS surveys in two orthopedic units (existing unit in Atrium building and new unit in Tower) with differing design features at Rush University Medical Center. The chi-square test results show that when moving from the old orthopedic unit to the new unit, almost all patient survey items related to patient experience showed statistically significant improvements. The second part of this study is a room level on the new unit. The ANOVA and Pearson correlation tests revealed that the visibility measure of metric step depth had significant impacts on patients' perception of staff's "promptness in responding to call button" and "help with toileting". This study confirms that inpatient unit design plays a direct role in improvement for patient experience and should be considered as an important area of focus for future development.

Improving the Patient Experience: Call Light Intervention Bundle

PURPOSE

Delays in call light response are a significant patient quality and safety concern. Research on call light interventions and patient outcomes has focused exclusively on adult inpatients. This project examined the impact of increasing staff awareness and workflow redesign to improve the pediatric patient experience and outcomes based on timely response.

DESIGN AND METHODS

A quality improvement project was conducted on two pediatric medical surgical units' (31 and 35 beds respectively) at a large Midwest academic medical center with patients' ages from to young adults. Data on staff knowledge, patient satisfaction, and fall rates was examined pre- and post-intervention of an evidence-based call light intervention bundle which included: 1) unit-based patient experience committees, 2) purposeful rounding, 3) pod buddy assignments, and 4) staff education.

RESULTS

Post-intervention both units demonstrated improvement in staff knowledge on call light interventions and exhibited sustained improvement in patient satisfaction scores for promptness to call. Likelihood to recommend the hospital and satisfaction with pain control improved for one of the two units. No impact on fall rates was noted over time for either unit.

CONCLUSIONS

A call light intervention bundle can positively impact patient satisfaction with promptness to call lights in pediatric medical surgical hospitalized patients and their families. Unlike adult patients, a call light intervention bundle did not impact fall rates in children and further study in pediatric fall reduction strategies is needed.

Perspectives of Nurses and Patients on Call Light Technology

Call lights are prevalent in inpatient healthcare facilities across the nation. While call light use directly influences the delivery of nursing care, there remain significant gaps both in research and technology that can affect the quality of care and patient satisfaction. This study examines nurse and patient perceptions of the use of a new call communication solution, Eloquence, in the acute care inpatient setting. Eighteen patients were recruited for the study and participated in individual semistructured interviews during their hospital stay. Eighteen nurses were recruited and participated in focus groups for this study. Qualitative descriptive methods were used to analyze the data. Results revealed themes of usability, improved communication, and suggestions for improvement to the alpha prototype design. After a demonstration of the use and capability of Eloquence, nurse and patient participants found Eloquence as a welcomed advancement in nurse call technology that has the potential to improve workflow and patient outcomes. In addition, the participants also proposed ideas on how to further develop the technology to improve its use.

Probabilistic Priority Assessment of Nurse Calls

Current nurse call systems are very static. Call buttons are fixed to the wall, and systems do not account for various factors specific to a situation. We have developed a software platform, the ontology-based Nurse Call System (oNCS), which supports the transition to mobile and wireless nurse call buttons and uses an intelligent algorithm to address nurse calls. This algorithm dynamically adapts to the situation at hand by taking the profile information of staff and patients into account by using an ontology. This article describes a probabilistic extension of the oNCS that supports a more sophisticated nurse call algorithm by dynamically assigning priorities to calls based on the risk factors of the patient and the kind of call. The probabilistic oNCS is evaluated through implementation of a prototype and simulations, based on a detailed dataset obtained from 3 nursing departments of Ghent University Hospital. The arrival times of nurses at the location of a call, the workload distribution of calls among nurses, and the assignment of priorities to calls are compared for the oNCS and the current nurse call system. Additionally, the performance of the system and the parameters of the priority assignment algorithm are explored. The execution time of the nurse call algorithm is on average 50.333 ms. Moreover, the probabilistic oNCS significantly improves the assignment of nurses to calls. Calls generally result in a nurse being present more quickly, the workload distribution among the nurses improves, and the priorities and kinds of calls are taken into account.