Nursing

Tips from TSE: Focus on four areas to improve patient satisfaction

Staff Development Weekly: Insight on Evidence-Based Practice in Education, February 20, 2009

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Achieving high patient satisfaction scores is every facility’s goal, especially the postoperative unit at Norton Suburban Hospital in Louisville, KY. The postoperative unit pushed its overall Press Ganey patient satisfaction scores from the 1st percentile in 2006 to the 97th percentile in 2007. The success came from the implementation of a patient satisfaction program, as well as from staff nurses focusing on four main areas:

  1. Pain. This includes the acceptable pain level determined by the patient, as well as pain medication ordered and the last time it was administered
  2. Information. Patients alert nurses of who they want to keep informed of their care, such as a spouse, child, or significant other and nurses serve as their messenger
  3. Activities of daily living. Nurses identify the level of activity assistance needed
  4. Special needs. Nurses incorporate anything that is important to the patient in their care (e.g., the patient wants dentures in before seeing visitors)

“Being a postoperative unit, keeping pain under control is utmost importance,” says Shelia Goold, RN, CBN, nurse manager of the unit. “We talk to patients about their appropriate pain threshold, what pain they are currently experiencing, and what is an acceptable pain level—and we work with them to maintain that pain level.”

For more ways to reduce pain, check out "Pain management: Educate to alleviate."

Editor’s note: This excerpt was adapted from the March issue of The Staff Educator. Discover all the benefits of subscribing to The Staff Educator! <>



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