Problem Identification Getting out of bed is one of the dangerous things that the elderly patients do when they are admitted in the hospital. Study conducted by Ambrose, Paul & Hausdorff, (2013) on patient falls reveals that a majority of falls in the elderly patients occur between 0700 and 1900, especially when they are getting out of bed to use the rest room. The cause of their falls is mainly due to unsteady gait, memory loss, confusion that comes with age. Memory loss and vision problems which occurs during old age in the elderly patients puts them at risk for falls. Other factors that can lead to falls are; Presence of throw rugs, psychotropic medications, lack of Vitamin D, and weakness of the lower extremities.
Introduction Patient safety is an important aspect of hospital care. Hospitals are entrusted to protect the patients, keep them safe while delivering a high quality care (Graham, 2012). As a result of announcements by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) that hospitals will no longer be reimbursed for hospital-acquired conditions (HAC) or never events, such as inpatient falls. In addition, reduction of harm from falls was identified by Joint Commission as a national patient safety goal. Fall is defined as an unexpected descent from a standing, sitting, or supine position (Hicks, 2015).
Lesson 7 Small-Group Discussion. Patient Safety Step 1 In a report by the Institute of Medicine (2006), Titled, Preventing Medication Errors, “The committee concludes that there are at least 1.5 million preventable adverse drug events (ADE’s) that occur in the United States each year.” These numbers are astonishing given the number of adults that are taking prescription medications daily. Most of the errors occur during the prescribing and administering steps and during an average hospital stay, a patient can expect to have one medication error occur every day (Institute of Medicine, 2006).
Introduction As a whole, fall injuries in hospital settings cost around $19 billion in the year of 2000. In 2020, the cost of falls is expected to cost over $54 billion (Hicks). The government deemed that since hospital falls were avoidable, they decided that they would no longer reimburse the expenses and instead the hospital would have to pay for the mistake by itself. With the cost of falls rising, it is even more important to bring to light the importance of fall prevention and safety.
L1: Know about the Ageing Process. 1.1: Describe the physical, psychological, social and emotional changes that an individual may experience as a result of ageing. Aging is another stage in the human life. It is synonymous to other life stages like childhood, adolescence and adulthood. The process of aging affects all people differently and is highly dependent on genes (hereditary), attitudes and lifestyle (CPA, 2009).
Falls are a considerable burden on patients, nurses, and hospitals. Preventing falls from happening should be a priority in healthcare organizations. While the risk of falling cannot be eliminated, it can be significantly reduced through the implementation of effective fall prevention programme (Oliver et al., 1997, Close et al., 1999). Such programme is to assess the fall-risk of patient during hospitalization as assessment enables appropriate preventive strategies to be implemented by using fall-risk assessment tool. However, there is few assessment tools have been subjected to extensive evaluation.
Demographics: Provide initials of the RN, official job title of interviewee, and the date the interview was conducted. ET, MSN, RN – Nursing Informatics Specialist – 2/1/17 Required Questions (answer EVERY question in this section) 1. Describe your career path to your current position. Include information about education and experiences. After ET graduated with her BSN, she was undoubtedly interested in informatics, but that wasn’t where her career started in the beginning.
A vital part of the nursing profession is nursing research. Clinical questions for specific patient problems are identified so that healthcare providers can find clinically relevant information using Internet search engines and databases (Higgins & Green, 2009). The main principle of nursing research is to produce new knowledge. The primary function of evidence based practice is to make evaluations about patient care built around the most current and best evidence that was collected by a systematic problem solving method. This paper will discuss hypothyroidism in pregnant women, and the risk fact of miscarriage during the first trimester of pregnancy.
The care for a patient with an acute illness is handled differently than a patient with a chronic illness. Acute illnesses are severe and sudden, while chronic illnesses are long term and cannot be prevented by vaccines or cured by medications (Acute Care). The care that a nurse gives to a patient with an acute illness is immediate and usually short term. This care involves treating the critical concerns and symptoms that the patient is displaying. The care that a nurse gives to a patient with a chronic illness are long-term treatments.
The focus of this paper is to evaluate the effectiveness of task specific gait training compared to standard prosthetic gait training in reducing falls in individuals with a lower extremity amputation. The fall risk for individuals with a lower extremity amputation is comparable to that of individuals with balance impairments. Reported incidences of falls are 20% to 32% during rehabilitation and 52% within the community (). There can be many causes for a lower extremity amputation, the most common being poor circulation due to the damaging or narrowing of the arteries also known as peripheral artery disease. Other causes include trauma, tumors in the muscle or bone, infection and neuroma.
Tammy did an excellent job by taking into consideration several things regarding her personal values. Of those that come to mind to her, when reflecting on the interview tools used, she believe honesty and accountability are at the top of her list. She believes a nurse must know her strengths and weaknesses in order to expand and improve. A potential employee must realize that the patient is the center of focus for the institution and staff and must be accountable to providing excellent care at all times. Tammy also states that effective communication would be a close second, because in order to be an effective nurse and employee, one must be able to communicate effectively.