Living for the weekend: electronic documentation improves patient handover

With increasing shift work the importance of effective handover is becoming more widely recognised, resulting in the production of guidelines on written handover documentation. A particular area of poor compliance was handover from the week to weekend teams for medical inpatients, as shown through an audit cycle. Full implementation of any guidelines can be time and financially costly. However, a simple, minimal cost, electronic-based list improved the quantitative measures of written handover, particularly in areas of patient location, resuscitation status and investigations. Qualitative data showed multiple benefits, but also problems with logistics in computer terminals, networks and access. Solutions to such problems are discussed, with the importance of carefully implemented longer-term changes being emphasised.