Improving efficiency within a trauma nurse practitioner team.

Area of Science:

• Nursing
• Quality Improvement
• Healthcare Management

Background:

• Nurse practitioners (NPs) experience frequent workflow interruptions, impacting patient safety and job satisfaction.
• Trauma NPs specifically reported challenges with interruptions, primarily from pager alerts, hindering efficient, high-quality care.

Purpose of the Study:

• To enhance trauma NPs' perception of patient safety and job satisfaction.
• To reduce workflow interruptions experienced by trauma NPs.

Main Methods:

• A quality improvement initiative guided by the Model for Improvement.
• Aims included reducing nonurgent pager alert interruptions by 20% and increasing standardized trauma NP patient rounding from 0% to 50%.

Main Results:

• Standardized rounding utilization increased from 0% to 87%.
• Interruptions via pager alerts decreased by 36.2%.
• 100% of surveyed trauma NPs reported improved perceptions of patient safety and job satisfaction.

Conclusions:

• A standardized rounding process, incorporating bedside registered nurses, effectively minimizes interruptions for trauma NP teams.
• This process improves communication and workflow efficiency, leading to better patient safety and job satisfaction.
• The successful implementation of a standardized rounding process was critical to the initiative's outcomes.