Supporting Nurses When a Patient Dies.

Area of Science:

• Nursing
• Healthcare Administration
• Clinical Psychology

Background:

• Patient death significantly impacts nurses, leading to underrecognized trauma, moral distress, and burnout.
• Nurses often face immediate reassignment, hindering essential postmortem care and personal processing time.
• A Post-Death Care Team Protocol was developed to systematically support nurses after a patient's death.

Purpose of the Study:

• To evaluate the early impact of a Post-Death Care Team Protocol on nurses' well-being.
• To report findings from focus groups and surveys on protocol effectiveness.
• To identify strategies for successful implementation of clinician support systems.

Main Methods:

• A mixed-methods approach involving qualitative focus groups and quantitative surveys was used.
• The protocol provided workload protection and additional break time for nurses after patient deaths.
• Data collected from 69 nurses over one year assessed protocol use and perceived helpfulness.

Main Results:

• Nurses desire meaningful support, including time for postmortem care and supervisor assistance with workload changes.
• The Post-Death Care Team Protocol was utilized in 42% of patient deaths during its first year.
• Anecdotal feedback indicated both positive benefits and negative experiences related to protocol implementation.

Conclusions:

• Findings suggest process improvements for post-patient death workflow and highlight the need for cultural change in peer support.
• The protocol offers system enhancements for meaningful nurse support and fosters institutional culture change.
• Addressing nurse well-being during critical events like patient death is crucial for retention and quality care.