Calling All Nurses: Improving Our Traditional Call Light System
As an emerging nurse leader, I am constantly searching for new ways to improve nursing practice and promote safe, high-quality patient care. I find fulfillment in responding to my patients in a timely manner and thinking of ways to increase their satisfaction. What if we could implement technology that our patients could use to directly contact their nurse?
The traditional call light system provides our patients with a remote control where they can push the big red button to inform the nurses’ station of their needs. In response, the nurses’ station will inform the nurse directly if nearby. Two other options are to inform the nurse through an overhead page or by calling the nurse’s hospital cell phone. The first option seems to be the most effective way to tell nurses that their patient needs them. The other two options are distracting and can interrupt or delay patient care.
What if we could adapt to new technology by introducing a portable, user-friendly, touch screen device? This device could provide patients with auto-formatted requests such as the need for pain medications. It also could help patients to directly reach their nurse-or another appropriate person like the unit secretary or a patient care technician-by wireless communication to a hospital-approved tablet technology. In the future, when hospitals move away from the use of laptop computers for communication and charting, being able to operate user-friendly tablets could help nurses and other healthcare workers to both send and receive messages in a timely, organized manner.
This approach could help minimize patient anxiety and maximize a nurse’s time and preparedness. Patients would be able to verbalize the need for their nurse, and the nurse could acknowledge their request and provide them with a time frame for response. Essentially, this could help increase patient satisfaction, decrease miscommunication, and make it known to the patient that the nurse has received the message. This system would help to increase readiness, so a nurse could have pain medications or other supplies on hand when entering a patient’s room. This would save time and help maximize patient care without the need to roll in a laptop or walk in and out of a patient’s room to get supplies to provide care.
In addition to delivering optimal healthcare, our aim as nurses is to provide hospitality and comfort our patients so they can get adequate rest. My opinion is that this evolving concept could help to advance communication between the patients and nurses, which will help promote a good bedside manner. As a nurse, there is nothing more satisfying than being prepared so you can understand and meet your patient’s needs. By continuing to collaborate with nurses everywhere and taking advantage of the latest in health technology, we can help to improve communication and better serve our patients. Please feel free to comment below or join the conversation via email, Facebook, or Twitter.
