Nurse Shadowing

We were given the opportunity to shadow nurses in the orthopedic unit at Johns Hopkins Hospital. Our collected notes from the encounter are below.

Equipment that they have:

-pink sleeves

-pull sheets

-hoyer lifts

-2 overhead track lifts

Patient population on the floor:

-a lot of spine surgeries → mobilization is an issue, extra restrictions

-little person, needs to use step stools

-drains, get in the way during patient transfer

-bone pain, have to medicate patients in order to mobilize (pain management)

-vertebrae fusion, disk removal

Observed a bed-to-bed transfer:

-detach as many things as possible (and move wires out of the way)

-lower side rails of patient bed

-bring in transfer bed = “stryker escort service”

-lower and lock bed to make both beds equal height

-tell patient “hug yourself”

-2 nurses pull sheet towards new bed (leaning all the way over new bed towards patient

bed)

-1 nurse on other side

-all 3 nurses pick up sheets and pull patient onto new bed

-bring up guard rail on new bed

Lifts aren’t used because they take too much time

1-3 minutes is ideal. Nurse says that in order to justify getting a machine, the transfer process would have to be equivalent in time to that of a manual transfer

Restrictions for patients in this wing:

-no bending or twisting

-spinal precautions

-can they pull with their arms? depends on the patient

-most patients are spinal or GSW/violence

Typically 2 nurses help one patient get out of bed (depends on size of patient)

Each nurse is assigned 3-6 patients per shift

Every patient has PT

-PT is typically doing patient transfer, getting them out of bed

Don’t usually use the crane lift

Nurses have 12 hour shifts

Night time:

-transferring patient from bed to bathroom and back

-usually 1-2 nurses