Quality Improvement Strategies II

1.       What did I expect to learn about this topic before beginning the unit?

I wanted to understand more of how my role as a nurse can influence/help improve quality improvement in the facility I work in. I also expected to learn about customer satisfaction and be reminded of the importance of those surveys.

2.      What I actually learned:

Patient satisfaction is a very important part of quality improvement. It is also very important in the hospital industry. People do their research. I would not want to work at a hospital that has a bad reputation in any sense. I know that my nursing practices have an influence on the scores my hospital/unit receives from each patient I interact with. I like the definition of satisfaction that was presented in this unit: satisfaction is how closely the result matched the expectation. This is very simple and very true. I would hope that those patients on my unit feel that their expectations were/are met. HCAHPS is a very important aspect of satisfaction and overall quality of the hospital. I know there is a website anyone can go onto and see the scores of many different hospitals in many different areas. These scores can make a huge difference in the decision making process of the patients or future patients. I want to help keep those scores of the hospital I work at high.

The case study this week helped me understand more of the importance of risk management. It is important to always pay attention to details and trends (good trends but especially negative trends).  It’s amazing what can happen if all the team members are noticing things all the time and paying attention to their practices and procedures. We are all here to help people heal and go back to living their lives. We owe it to them to do our jobs and reduce risks.

The discussion about EBP helped me realize how I can be an influence to other coworkers regarding EBP. I do feel intimidated to speak up sometimes to other coworkers because I know I am a new grad and they have much more experience than I do. However, I feel empowered from this discussion and know that I can speak up just like we tell patients to do. I need to be the example and follow EBP myself before I can expect others to do the same. I can encourage others just by doing it. I also want to focus on being proactive and doing the research for myself to understand why we do things a certain way. By taking the time to understand it for myself, I can help teach others and have data and evidence to back me up.

3.      My feelings/experiences from the individual and team activities:

I though the discussion this week went well. I liked that is was focused on a topic that we are dealing with right now. I think it was good for all of us to share our feelings about being a new nurse and how that can come across to others and what things we can do to combat that with EBP. The case study was good in reminding us of the risk management resources we have. It is good to know that if we miss something as nurses there is another team double checking us. I though the reading was interesting and easy to understand. Patient satisfaction is a fun topic to discuss and one that definitely makes a huge difference in the overall quality of the hospital.

4.      How I will utilize the information learned in my nursing practice:

Being reminded of customer satisfaction scores and their importance makes me want to ensure that I really focus on those things with my patients. I want to make sure they feel their pain needs are addressed and under control. I want them to feel they have direct and effective communication with myself as well as the doctors if I can help it. I want to make sure they feel comfortable in their rooms and that I do what I can to ensure its cleanliness. I want to be a part of a magnificent hospital. While I think the hospital I work at is very close to that, there is always room for improvement and that begins with me. I want to be an example to my coworkers and help influence them to not be lazy and follow EBP with everything they do.

5.      My personal feelings about the material covered:

I thought this week was nice. The material was not complicated but still very important. Customer satisfaction, survey scores, risk management, and EBP are all things I felt were focused on and they all have an influence on each other as well as contributing to continuous quality improvement.