Geetha Jayaram
rsing and the Armstrong Institute for Patient Safety, USA
Title: The role of nurses in coordinating and implementing patient safety in psychiatry over 2 decades
Biography
Biography: Geetha Jayaram
Abstract
Objectives:
- Apply science to nursing safety methods to evaluate them
- Utilize a systems perspective
- Minimize the impact of errors and maximize recovery in nursing practice.
Over the past two decades, safety climate research has been widely explored in other high reliability industries including railways, nuclear power plants, commercial aviation, manufacturing, and other industries. The first effort at identifying and outlining safety initiatives in psychiatry occurred through the cohesive efforts of the Patient Safety Committee of the American Psychiatric Association in 2002 and by the American Psychiatric Nursing Association in 2012. With regulatory bodies and insurance companies, emphasis on the safety movement in Psychiatry has focused on the psychiatrist/nursing interface. Safety failures causing sentinel events have repeatedly highlighted several areas: failure to train, thoroughly assess, communicate, monitor, & provide resources for patient protection, including a safe environment. Ways to avoid continuous observation and promote de-escalation will be discussed.
Among improvements made in this area are screening for and prevention of aggression, preventing inpatient suicide, providing the correct level of observation and instructing observers; preventing medication errors with medication reconciliation, detecting system flaws and preventing adverse events such as falls. Risk assessments by nurses as our frontline staff are of paramount importance. Methods and tools used to promote safety will be discussed and examples provided.
Overall, establishing a climate of safety and promoting a culture of safety with the involvement of leaders will be reviewed.