Developing Leadership Skills in Nursing: A Proposal

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Problem or Issue

Developing leadership skills in the nursing profession is essential to improve the quality of care hospitals provide. This proposal focuses on creating a comfort squad comprising two patient care technicians to provide hygiene care, turn, and reposition patients with restricted mobility. Patient care technicians are specially trained in using the appropriate tools and resources to move and provide comfort and safety for patients at risk for pressure ulcers. The proposal aims at developing a compassionate, patient-centered approach to caring for patients with restricted mobility that satisfies their needs by improving collaboration between medical units. The empirical and theoretical knowledge shows that introducing convenient ways of electronic communication between healthcare professionals and creating electronic schedules of tasks that are available for all nurses and doctors facilitate the dialogue significantly. It allows healthcare professionals to avoid situations when no one pays attention to a patient with restricted mobility due to lack of time and neglect.

Explanation of Problem or Issue

I work in a forty-bed Medical/Surgical unit at a hospital, making the investigation practice-oriented. During shift change and the night, I notice that patients with reduced mobility are not being turned and repositioned as often as the patient care technician should. As a result, some of these patients show early signs of pressure injuries. This problem negatively affects the patients and the hospital due to the aggravation of the adverse health symptoms, erosion of safety and quality of care indicators, and the loss of reputation of the hospital. Therefore, this problem is directly connected with practical nursing, focuses on the interests of patients with reduced mobility, and correlates with the healthcare organization’s priorities. It is vital to solve this issue to provide patients with high-quality and safe medical care because patients with reduced mobility are among the most vulnerable categories of people in the hospital who cannot adequately protect their rights.

Investigation of Patient Turning Problem

It is crucial to find a balanced way of communication between healthcare professionals and different healthcare units in one hospital that is quick and effective at the same time. Introducing a timetable that employees may amend, adding new duties, assigning workers to complete it, and processing the job online could eliminate the current difficulties with neglect of patients with limited mobility. It is critical to emphasize this topic separately from other tasks that nurses and patient care technicians must complete daily (Hirschmann, Rosler, & Fortin Vi, 2020). This special attention to controlling the physical state of the patients with restricted mobility might attract the attention of the personnel to this question, and the convenient online schedule that focuses on this issue specifically might facilitate completing these tasks.

Analysis of the Factors that Contribute to Turning Problem

Mostly all issues are connected to staff problems or non-adherence to the turning schedule. The current data shows that the issues associated with patients with restricted mobility are relevant to most hospitals due to the need for constant human supervision. The number of work nurses has to complete during the shift is sometimes more than they can do physically. As a result, it is impossible to pay enough attention to all patients who require it. Moreover, in most cases, patients with restricted mobility need additional attention from nurses, who do not always have the option to help them without the assistance of patient care technicians.

Proposed Solution or Innovation

The main reason that causes neglect of patients with restricted mobility is the lack of communication between nurses, patient care technicians, and physicians; their function is to provide hygiene and incontinent care. A nurse or a physician cannot move the patient with limited mobility in most cases, and they must have a direct channel of communication with patient care technicians. Therefore, establishing direct contact between these healthcare units in the hospital is the practically effective solution to this problem.

Justification of Proposed Solution or Innovation

It is possible to distinguish between formal and informal communication between healthcare units, which is divided into written and verbal in its turn. Proper communication is always written, and it traditionally occurs in emails, inquiries, or letters. Informal communication is the dialogue in the group chat of workers during one shift or verbal interaction that allows the employees to solve current issues (Hirschmann, Rosler, & Fortin Vi, 2020). The main concern is that formal written communication is slow. In contrast, informal communication does not require an answer from the nurse, patient care technician, or a physician, and they can forget about the details mentioned during this interaction.

Resources and Cost-Benefit Analysis

Introducing the new online schedule specializing in patients with restricted mobility is cost-effective. The healthcare personnel in the hospital already has a plan for the tasks they need to complete during the shift. Therefore, adding one category not represented in the schedule before does not require much investment. The IT department of the hospital can cope with this task during one hour of work. The critical detail is that managers should inform all employees in the hospital about this innovation to attract their attention to the existing problem they should solve in the nearest future. Therefore, the discussed initiative requires one hour of work from the IT department and a brief review from the manager to inform physicians, nurses, and patient care technicians about this innovation and their new responsibility.

As was already mentioned in this paper, I work in the hospital’s forty-bed Medical/Surgical unit. It means that the number of patients with restricted mobility is comparatively low, but still, they require special attention from the healthcare personnel. It allows me to hypothesize that the amount of additional work might not increase significantly after introducing the online schedule for the personnel. Moreover, the number of problems with the health state of these patients might decrease because constant care for their well-being improves their overall condition.

Engagement with the Key Stakeholder

It is possible to assume that several partners or stakeholders participate in implementing the proposed solution. First, it is necessary to contact the IT department and ask them whether adding the described type of schedule is practically possible and how much they need to complete it. Second, it is critical to ask the manager to pay attention to the issues connected with moving patients with restricted mobility and checking their state regularly.

The manager can gather all employees who work in the healthcare unit to propose a plan to solve this problem and attract their attention to this issue. The manager’s participation in setting the goal to control the physical state of patients with restricted mobility and maintaining how this problem is solved in practice is essential. It gives nurses, patient care technicians, and physicians the feeling that this issue is critical in making patient care more centered around the ill person’s needs (Cahill et al., 2020). Therefore, the centralized approach to solving the issue with patients with restricted mobility increases the chances of eliminating the existing problem. The manager was receptive after I brought up the problem that the pcts were not following the turning schedule to reposition and provide patient care to vulnerable pts due to the high pct-to-pct ratio.

Anticipated Outcome/Success

The success of the implementation is manifested in the quality and safety of care after the first probation month. The new schedule might show the healthcare personnel whether nurses and patient care technicians pay enough attention to the patients with restricted mobility. Moreover, the objective evaluation of the health state of these patients might also reflect the results of the daily care of nurses and patient care technicians. Asking patients with restricted mobility for their feedback concerning the work of the hospital personnel is also critical in coming up with an objective analysis of the initiative. They can describe their attitude to the frequency of the personnel’s attention and the quality of the services they provide the person during their shifts. This opinion will make the care for the patient more focused on their personal needs and desires, which is the critical component of healing.

Implementation

Nurses and patient care technicians are directly responsible for checking the state of the patients with restricted mobility in their hospital unit and moving them. It is critical to make sure that all of them clearly understand their task to check their state regularly and mark it in the new online schedule. The motivation of nurses and patient care technicians is especially vital because they perform these tasks during their shifts.

Patient care technicians and nurses might resist changes concerning their schedule because they are used to their old regime and do not see the need for its reformation. For this reason, it is essential to explain to them the existing problem with patients with restricted mobility, give them clear instructions concerning the new plan of work, and motivate them with bonuses. Additional payment for this responsibility might help achieve success in implementing this plan during the first month. The critical detail is that healthcare professionals are also motivated to improve their competencies, and when they understand that they miss the essential thing in providing patients with a sufficient level of care, they try to solve their mistakes (Hirschmann, Rosler, & Fortin Vi, 2020). For this reason, the hospital should provide nurses, physicians, and patient care technicians with the opportunity to optimize their work and improve the quality of the services they provide. After the probation period, nurses and patient care technicians might become used to the new schedule and pay more attention to the patients with restricted mobility automatically due to the habit they have already developed.

Role of Scientist

The initiative to introduce the new specific schedule that focuses on caring for patients with restricted mobility allows me to develop the qualities of a scientist. First, this decision results from the scientific analysis of the means of communication used in the hospital. Most people do not think about how they communicate with each other, but practice shows that choosing the inappropriate method leads to communicative failure. It is hazardous in the hospital where the person wants to provide their patients with safety and high-quality care. Therefore, the analysis allows me to choose the appropriate interaction between healthcare professionals and implement this theoretical information in clinical practice. The research of the topic and the implementation of the discussed way to reform communication within the hospital unit allow me to use scientific data in healthcare decisions.

Role of the Detective

As a detective, the nurse uses her clinical creativity and nursing theory to assess and analyze the impact of minor deviations and variations from standard patterns in order to manage and prevent negative consequences. Nurses are educated to explore people’s features and should build an eye for detail like investigators. Research nurses must have a good awareness of the research method and terminology, as well as a complete comprehension of the specialty being studied. Patients’ comfort and security are ensured by the nurses, who also provide that patients are fully supported during the research project.

Role of the Manager of the Healing Environment

A caring and healing setting is what a healing environment is. Healing places provide sensations of quiet and tranquility while reducing the stress of a hectic atmosphere. Nurses, as administrators of the healing environment, promote staff participation in judgment, whether in terms of building trust or job design. Maintaining and fostering a healthy working environment requires the cooperation of a nurse manager in developing just and good safety policies.

References

Cahill, L. S., Carey, L. M., Lannin, N. A., Turville, M., Neilson, C. L., Lynch, E. A., McKinstry, C. E., Han, J. X., & O’Connor, D. (2020). Implementation of interventions to promote the uptake of evidence-based practices in stroke rehabilitation. The Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, 10(10), 1-154.

Hirschmann, K., Rosler, G., & Fortin Vi, A. H. (2020). “For me, this has been transforming”: A qualitative analysis of interprofessional relationship-centered communication skills training.Journal of Patient Experience, 7(6), 1007–1014.

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