Waiting and hoping: a phenomenographic study of the experiences of boarded patients in the emergency department

Implementation of the admission transfer unit to reduce emergency department boarding: A quality improvement initiative

Emergency Department (ED) boarding crowds the emergency department, strains resources, leads to higher hospital costs, and is associated with increased morbidity/mortality, a negative patient experience, and patient adverse events. The time Ontario patients wait in emergency departments for inpatient beds continues to rise, with the average time admitted patients spend in the ED increasing between 2015 and 2019 from 13.8 hours to 16.2 hours. As reported in this quality improvement initiative, one potential solution is to repurpose short-stay medical assessment units for complex admitted medicine patients using an objective patient selection tool. Objectively selecting admitted ED patients with the highest risk for adverse events and prioritizing them to move to a transitional unit advances safe quality patient care and decreases Time-to-Inpatient Bed (TIB). Results from this quality improvement initiative include reducing the organization's TIB by 13 hours.

Clinicians' Insights on Emergency Department Boarding: An Explanatory Mixed Methods Study Evaluating Patient Care and Clinician Well-Being

BACKGROUND

The aim of this study was to describe clinicians' insights into the quality and safety of patient care delivered to emergency department (ED) boarding patients, as well as clinician safety and satisfaction related to ED boarding.

METHODS

This was a single-site, mixed methods sequential explanatory study. Quantitative data were obtained from a cross-sectional survey sent to ED attending physicians, resident physicians, advanced practice providers, and nurses. Semistructured focus group interviews with a subsample of participants sought to add depth to the interpretation of survey data and identify areas of improvement in boarding care. Chi-square and Wilcoxon rank sum tests were used to evaluate for response differences between groups. Qualitative data were thematically coded and analyzed.

RESULTS

A total of 94 questionnaires were obtained for a response rate of 34.1%. Clinicians reported that boarding highly contributed to the perception of burnout. All groups reported high rates of perceived verbal and/or physical abuse from boarding patients (86.8% of nurses, 41.1% of providers, p = 0.0002). A total of 39 clinicians participated in focus groups regarding boarding care, and six themes were identified, including patient safety concerns, lack of knowledge/resources/training, and poor communication. Key themes identified as possible solutions to improve care included standardization of care, proactive planning, and culture change.

CONCLUSION

Clinicians identified many concerns regarding patient safety and the quality of care delivered to boarding patients and identified several areas for improvement. Clinicians also felt that boarding negatively affected their satisfaction and safety.

Antibiotic use in children under 5 years of age in Northern Tanzania: a qualitative study exploring the experiences of the caring mothers

Background

Antimicrobial resistance is a serious threat to the global achievements in child health thus far. Previous studies have found high use of antibiotics in children in Northern Tanzania, but the experiences of the primary care-givers, who play a key role in accessing and administering antibiotics for the sick child, have remained largely unknown. Therefore, the aim of this study was to understand mothers’ conceptions of antibiotic use in their children, which is of importance when forming strategies to improve antibiotic use in the community.

Method

A qualitative study including eight focus group discussions with mothers of under-five children in Moshi urban and rural districts, Northern Tanzania, was performed during 2019. The discussions were recorded, transcribed verbatim, translated into English and analysed according to the phenomenographic approach.

Findings

Three conceptual themes emerged during analysis; (1) conceptions of disease and antibiotics, (2) accessing treatment and (3) administering antibiotics. Antibiotics were often perceived as a universal treatment for common symptoms or diseases in children with few side-effects. Although mothers preferred to attend a healthcare facility, unforeseen costs, long waits and lack of financial support from their husbands, posed barriers for healthcare seeking. However, pharmacies were perceived as a cheap and convenient option to access previously used or prescribed antibiotics. Some mothers sought advice from a trusted neighbour regarding when to seek healthcare, thus resembling the function of the community health worker.

Conclusions

To improve antibiotic use in children under 5 years of age in Northern Tanzania, the precarious situation that women often find themselves in as they access treatment for their sick children needs to be taken into consideration. It is necessary to improve structures, including the healthcare system, socioeconomic inequalities and promoting gender equality both in the household and in the public arena to reduce misuse of antibiotics. Meanwhile, equipping community health workers to support Tanzanian women in appropriate healthcare seeking for their children, may be a feasible target for intervention.

Supplementary Information

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s13756-022-01169-w.

The Meaning of Boarding in a Swedish Accident & Emergency Department: A Qualitative Study on Patients' Experiences of Awaiting Admission

The number of in-hospital beds in Sweden has decreased during recent decades, resulting in the smallest number (2.2 available beds/1000 inhabitants) within the European Union. At the same time, the number of patients attending Accident and Emergency (A&E) departments has increased, resulting in overcrowding and boarding. The aim of this study was to explore the meaning of being subjected to boarding at an A&E department, as experienced by patients. A phenomenological-hermeneutic approach was chosen to interpret and understand the meaning of boarding at A&E. The study was carried out at a hospital in the south of Sweden. Seventeen participants with a mean age of 64 years (range: 35-86 years) were interviewed. The thematic structural analysis covers seven themes: Being in a state of uncertainty, Feeling abandoned, Fearing death, Enduring, Adjusting to the circumstances, Being a visitor in an unsafe place, and Acknowledging the staff, all illustrating that the participants were in a state of constant uncertainty and felt abandoned with no guidance or support from the clinicians. The conclusion is that the situation where patients are forced to wait in A&E, i.e., boarding, violates all conditions for professional ethics, presumably causing profound ethical stress in the healthcare professionals involved. Thus, boarding should be avoided.

Do Emergency Nurses Spend Enough Time on Nursing Activities? The Relationship Between Actual and Expected Patient Care Nursing Time

Background

The overcrowded environments of emergency departments (EDs) lead to increased clinical workloads for nurses and infl uences the quality of patient care. This study aimed to evaluate whether the quality of patient care meets the expectations of emergency nurses in Taiwan by measuring the amount of time nurses spend on patient care activities.

Methods

The direct observation study was conducted in one suburban academic hospital with approximately 80,000 annual ED visits. This study observed emergency nurses and the time they spent on their nursing activities. The directly measured times and nurse expected patient care nursing times were compared.

Results

For all 88 types of nursing activities recorded, each measured nursing time was less than the expected nursing time. On average, the measured nursing time was 82% less than the expected nursing time (2.0 ± 0.3 minutes vs. 11.6 ± 1.5 minutes, p < 0.01). Among the 88 types of nursing activities recorded, the average measured time spent on 76 types (86%) was less than 3 minutes. The nursing activity on which the longest time was spent was cerebrospinal fl uid study nursing (7 minutes). The most frequent nursing activity was documentation.

Conclusion

The nursing time spent on patient-care activities in EDs was much less than the nurses expected. The results may provide a basis for nursing quality measurements and manpower calculations for EDs.

First line nurse managers' experiences of opportunities and obstacles to support evidence-based nursing

AIM

The aim was to explore first line nurse managers' experiences of opportunities and obstacles to support evidence-based nursing.

DESIGN

A qualitative study with a phenomenographical approach.

METHOD

Data were collected through focus group interviews with 15 first line nurse managers' in four settings.

RESULTS

The results are presented in four categories of description headed: Manage the everyday work vs. evidence-based nursing; Uncertainties about evidence-based nursing and nursing research; Time as a reality, as an approach; and Shaping awareness-towards an active approach to evidence-based nursing. The overarching category of description has been formulated as follows: The internal relation-how active leadership influences evidence-based nursing. The outcome space is presented as: The individual path-how to make vision and reality become a working entity around evidence-based nursing.