Clinicals 7

I spent 4 hours with my preceptor today because he had to leave early. We attended a patient flow committee meeting. The meeting consisted of nurse managers, registration manager, and environmental services manager. The meeting was led by the VP of quality improvement. She directed the flow of the meeting and allowed the department managers to express their concerns regarding patient admits and discharges. The patient to discharge/admit goal is 130 minutes from door to admit/discharge. This was a very interesting meeting and I was happy to be able to attend because my change project is based on patient flow in the ED. My change project is called the ER Faxed Reporting Change Project. Initially, the ED nurses were waiting until the bed was cleaned before they faxed the report to the floor and the floor nurses either didn't have time to review the report or they were too busy and this would cause a delay in ED patient stay. This also occupies a well needed bed by triage or ambulances. I suggested that instead of waiting for the bed to be clean, why not fax the report once the orders are written and that way once the bed is clean,the patient could go to the floor. The ED director really liked this idea and allowed me to implement this in the ED. I am looking forward to comparing the data and evaluating my project.