In 2005, Denver Health Medical Center was awarded an Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) Partnerships in Implementing Patient Safety (PIPS) grant for our project titled: Improving Patient Safety through Provider Communication Strategy Enhancements. 

 

Purpose

The purpose of this project is to implement and evaluate a comprehensive team communication strategy, develop an implementation toolkit that can be generalized to other settings of care, and improve patient safety by decreasing errors related to team communication failures in the hospital setting.

 

Specific Aims

·        Implement a standardized communication tool – SBAR (a situational briefing model) as a guide for communicating changes in patient status or needs

·        Develop and implement an escalation process tool to facilitate timely communication

·        Implement multi-disciplinary patient centered rounds utilizing a daily goals sheet 

·        Implement team huddles each shift

 

Methods

·        Pretest-posttest data collection design

·        Time frame: July 2005 – June 2007

·        Setting: Denver Health Medical Center; Medical Intensive Care Unit (MICU), Acute Care Unit (ACU), Adult and Adolescent Behavioral Health Units

·        Sample: Healthcare team members

·        Incorporates baseline data collection & implementation of the team communication interventions, followed by data collection & analysis

 

Expected Project Outcomes

·        Decreased communication failures as a contributing factor in Patient Safety Net reports

·        Decreased time to treatment for non-emergent patient care requiring consultation between physicians and nurses

·        Improvement in a culture of patient safety

·        Development of a toolkit that can be generalized to other settings of care