Acute care nurses' decisions to recognise and respond to patient improvement: A qualitative study

To explore and describe acute care nurses' decisions to recognise and respond to improvement in patients' clinical states as they occurred in the real-world clinical environment.

A descriptive study.

Nine medical and eleven surgical nurses in a large Australian metropolitan hospital were individually observed during nurse-patient interactions and followed up in interview to describe their reasoning and clinical judgements behind observed decisions. Verbal description of observations and interviews were recorded and transcribed. Reflexive thematic analysis was used to analyse the data.

The three themes constructed from the data were as follows: nurses checking in; nurses reaching judgements about improvements; and nurses deciding on the best person to respond. Acute care nurses made targeted assessment decisions based on predicted safety risks related to improvement in clinical states. Subjective and objective cues were used to assess for and make judgements about patient improvement. Acute care nurses' judgment of patient safety and a desire to promote patient centred care guided their decisions to select the appropriate person to manage improvement.

The outcomes of this research have demonstrated that the proven safety benefits of acute care nurses' decision making in response to deterioration extend to improvement in patients' clinical states. In response to improvement, acute care nurses' decisions protect patients from harm and promote recovery.

Early recognition and response to improvement enable acute care nurses to protect patients from risks of unnecessary treatment and promote recovery.

This study makes explicit nurses' essential safety role in recognising and responding to improvement in patients' clinical states. Healthcare policy and education must reflect the equal importance of assessment for and management of deterioration and improvement to ensure patients are protected and provided with safe care.