Infusion pump education quality improvement project
Abstract:
Purpose: This quality improvement project was designed to increase the number of registered nurses who have been educated and are proficient in working with the infusion medical pumps used for patients receiving continuous peripheral nerve block or epidural infusions. Our aim was to increase by 10% the percentage of nurses who are proficient with infusion pumps and increase by 25% the ability of nursing staff on 4 West at Brooke Army Medical Center to hang a new infusion bag and subsequently program the pump.
Design: Our outcome measured pre and post intervention surveys and timing exercises assessing the ability and efficiency of the nurses hanging new infusion bags and programming the pumps.
Methods: We gathered baseline data via surveys and a timing exercise. We then implemented a visual aid with simple instructions affixed to the pump and formally educated the nursing staff. Finally, we measured the results via surveys and repeated the timing exercise.
Findings: We achieved both of our objectives. We increased the number of registered nurses who were educated and who were proficient in working with the infusion medical pumps. Prior to the project, 80% of the nurses felt proficient with infusion pumps and 45% of nurses were able to hang a new infusion bag. After the visual aid was affixed to the pumps and the nurses were educated, 95% of nurses felt proficient with infusion pumps and 91% were able to hang a new infusion bag. Nurses also showed an increase in efficiency in hanging a new infusion bag with an average decreased time to successful programing of 41 seconds.
Conclusion: This project demonstrated that affixing visual aids and formalizing hands-on education can lead to significantly increased proficiency with infusion medical pumps and efficiency in hanging a new infusion bag. Ultimately, we hope this may lead to significant reductions in hospital cost by limiting time spent by physicians and nurses changing infusion bags and increase the quality of patient care by decreasing the amount of time patient analgesia is delayed.
Reference:
Scheide T, Patzkowski M, Staples J, Boone M, Castillo W, McElrath A. Infusion Pump Education: A Quality Improvement Project. J Perianesth Nurs. 2024 May 30:S1089-9472(24)00048-0. doi: 10.1016/j.jopan.2024.02.002. Epub ahead of print. PMID: 38819360.