Achieving More with Less in the ICU

The escalating nursing shortage in the U.S is having a profound impact on the ability to deliver quality healthcare. Recent national media coverage and proposed legislation on patient safety and staffing highlight these issues and lead us to realize the need to make fundamental changes to raise the level of quality, safety, efficiency of patient care, as well as the level of job satisfaction of our nation’s nurses.

Nursing as a profession is in crisis mode, with a predicted shortage of 400,000 nurses by 2010 in the United States alone. Recently, an investigation by The Chicago Tribune found that thousands of patients are dying every year as hospitals lose staff and are forced to manage their workload with less. According to the report, since 1995, more than 1,700 patient deaths could be attributed to mistakes made by overworked nurses under pressure to provide patient care with shrinking resources.

According to a recent study in The Journal of Advanced Nursing, nurses found satisfaction from direct patient care, yet their role was changing to be the organizer of paperwork and coordinator of care. Many nurses cited their frustration at the increasing need for documentation while caring for more acutely ill patients with fewer resources as a factor in leaving the profession, or discouraging others from entering the profession. Nurses need tools at their disposal that help them care for sicker patients in a highly regulated environment with increasing documentation demands, especially in critical care where clinical documentation can take 25 - 40 percent of a nurse’s time.

The Picis CareSuite solutions reduce the data-gathering burden of the nurse and help save time, improve patient care, reduce overtime, provide a safe work area, deliver a complete and legible record and reduce errors in critical care environments.

Picis provides hospitals with the information technology tools needed to put nurses where they can make the most positive impact on patient safety and quality of care -- at the critical care bedside performing direct hands-on-care. CareSuite automates the ICU flowsheet and the clinical standards and practice guidelines that drive this documentation. CareSuite automatically captures data from all bedside devices, greatly enhancing the accuracy of documentation and easing the nurse’s workload. Nurses can spend more time with the patient and less time on paperwork.

Janice Prata, one of the nursing ‘super users’ of the CareSuite system at Christiana Care Health System commented, “I like the actual hands-on care part of nursing, but I’ve never liked the paperwork. The new system has made me a better recorder because my notes are more complete and my thought processes have become more orderly… And if certain checks are required after a procedure, or if certain protocols need to be followed, the computer prompts you for the information. It helps you keep track of things that could easily be forgotten. The computer is right there indicating ‘You need to fill in this blank.’”

CareSuite helps reduce nursing overtime, an issue being watched closely by clinicians and hospitals in this era of cost containment. When a patient is unstable and requires constant hands-on intervention, documentation is not the highest priority. Yet reimbursement, accreditation, and legal requirements require the most accurate and complete recording of vital patient data. The need to catch up on charting after a busy day is a frequently cited reason for overtime. CareSuite’s automatic and retrospective capture of patient information can drastically reduce the frequency and amount of overtime needed to complete documentation.

Christiana Care’s Prata added, “The CareSuite system is most useful to us in recording hard data. Previously, if you didn’t get to a patient quite on time - or if you were busy with something else, maybe assisting with a procedure - you couldn’t be there to record the vital signs. The system is always there, so the data is always being collected. It gives you a free set of hands to circulate around the room and help out with other things.”

With so much at stake in critical patient care, Picis is proud to offer a tool to the nursing profession that improves workflow, the quality of patient care, and job satisfaction. Working in partnership with forward-thinking healthcare institutions that implement care automation solutions, Picis is leading the way to address this national healthcare crisis.