Assignment: Implications for Patient Safety

Assignment: Implications for Patient Safety
Assignment: Implications for Patient Safety
Assignment: Implications for Patient Safety
Unit 4 discussion Workarounds and Their Implications for Patient Safety What is a workaround? Identify a workaround (specific to technology used in a hospital setting) that you have used or perhaps seen someone else use, and analyze why you feel this risk-taking behavior was chosen over behavior that conforms to a safety culture. What are the risks? Are there benefits? Why or why not? Discuss the current patient safety characteristics used by your current workplace or clinical site. Identify at least three aspects of your workplace or clinical environment that need to be changed with regard to patient safety (including confidentiality), and then suggest strategies for change.
Workarounds are usually shortcuts in the workplace to get things done faster. I’ve always had nurses tell me, “do as I say, not as I do.” I have heard this so many times that it is scary how many nurses find loopholes to get things done in a short period of time. A lot of times when vitals are being taken on a patient that has just been transferred to the floor, the pulse oximetry sometimes fails to work. I noticed that there isa certain machine that has a rubber band around the pulse oximetry to hold it in place on a patient’s finger. Working in environments of increasingly complex clinical care and contending with the management of large volumes of information, nurses need to take advantage of the technological tools that can support a quality practice that is optimally safe, informed, and knowledge-based (McGonigle & Mastrain, 2015). I have informed the nurses of the problem and they state that a “work order” has been placed. These are patients who have just come up from surgery or are battling some sort of illness.