Charity Anne Rowley, Brigham Young University
Health
In 2010, The Office of the Inspector General of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services reported that adverse events during hospitalization contribute to the deaths of 180,000 patients each year! The purpose of this study is to improve patient safety in the hospital by understanding the role of the charge nurse(the 24/7 nursing supervisor in hospital units).
A convenience sample was taken including 28 nurses working on a variety of hospital units. The nurses are predominantly female, and have an average of 18.7 years of work experience. They received a survey in which they rated the amount of influence the charge nurse has on patient safety, reported characteristics of safe charge nurses, and described situations in which charge nurses have influenced patient safety.
The results showed that 86% of nurses agreed that the charge nurse has a great influence on their ability to deliver safe patient care. In addition, 81% of nurses agreed that the charge nurse plays a critical role in ensuring patient safety. The top three qualities reported to describe a safe charge nurse included: educator/communicator, prioritization skills, and years of clinical experience. Finally, the themes that arose from the qualitative questions indicated that safe charge nurses: provide task assistance, are resources of knowledge, and are available/ team-players. Themes indicating what makes a charge nurse unsafe included: being unavailable, poor staffing/delegation skills, and is approachable.
We conclude that charge nurses play an important role in patient safety. It is necessary that the charge nurse is a good educator, understands how to make safe assignments, and is approachable. When hiring and evaluating the performance of a charge nurse, these characteristics will be valuable indicators of how that charge nurse is influencing safety in his or her hospital unit.