Abstract

Session presented on Saturday, July 23, 2016 and Sunday, July 24, 2016:

Purpose: Frontline nursing staff experience first-order operational failures negatively impacting their ability to provide optimal care. Frontline nurses problem solve and navigate around first-order operational failures using 'workaround' solutions to overcome encountered system failures. Participation in the Improvement Science Research Network's (ISRN) Small Troubles, Adaptive Responses (STAR-2++) study aimed to contribute to global and institutional nursing knowledge by identifying and reporting practice environment relationships with direct care clinicians' quality improvement engagement and clinical outcomes in the surgical intensive care, pediatric medical-surgical, and oncology units. By tracking and developing a better understanding of first-order system failures, researchers seek to identify relationships among practice environment, frontline nurse quality improvement engagement, and clinical outcomes in three hospital acute care units. Combining data from 14 participating hospitals furthers global knowledge and understanding of frontline nurses' quality improvement engagement and clinical outcomes.

Methods: Prospective, cross-sectional, multivariate, quantitative research study was conducted. Research was conducted at a large urban 881 bed acute nonprofit tertiary-care hospital in West Texas. Nurses recruited for study participation according to the STAR-2++ study protocol. Unit data was collected from unit locked boxes and entered into a data collection network for aggregated analysis. Purposes were to measure the following study variables: 1) incidence and type of first-order operational failures encountered by direct care registered nurses during their work shift on a clinical unit; 2) associations between staff identified first-order operational failures encountered on the frontline of care delivery and those detected by non-participant observers; and 3) associations among frontline engagement (measurement of detection of operational defects and team vitality study variables), work environment (measurement of culture of patient safety and excellence in work environment study variables), and quality improvement outcomes (measurement of quality improvement activities, quality of care, and job satisfaction study variables).

Results: To be determined.

Conclusions: Study results informed the participating acute care institution of existing system issues leading to first-order operational failures, thus improving patient care provided by frontline nursing staff.

Author Details

Jamie K. Roney, RN-BC, CCRN; Aruna Maharjan, RN; Sheryll Mae Coulombe, RN; Elizabeth Jo Davis, RN; Frances Cortes, RN; JoAnn D. Long, RN, NEA-BC

Sigma Membership

Iota Mu

Type

Poster

Format Type

Text-based Document

Study Design/Type

N/A

Research Approach

N/A

Keywords:

Nursing Workaround Behaviors, First-order Operational Failures, Micro and Macro System Failures

Conference Name

27th International Nursing Research Congress

Conference Host

Sigma Theta Tau International

Conference Location

Cape Town, South Africa

Conference Year

2016

Rights Holder

All rights reserved by the author(s) and/or publisher(s) listed in this item record unless relinquished in whole or part by a rights notation or a Creative Commons License present in this item record.

All permission requests should be directed accordingly and not to the Sigma Repository.

All submitting authors or publishers have affirmed that when using material in their work where they do not own copyright, they have obtained permission of the copyright holder prior to submission and the rights holder has been acknowledged as necessary.

Review Type

Abstract Review Only: Reviewed by Event Host

Acquisition

Proxy-submission

Share

COinS
 

Addressing nursing workaround solutions to encountered problems: Engagement of frontline nurses in STAR-2++ network study

Cape Town, South Africa

Session presented on Saturday, July 23, 2016 and Sunday, July 24, 2016:

Purpose: Frontline nursing staff experience first-order operational failures negatively impacting their ability to provide optimal care. Frontline nurses problem solve and navigate around first-order operational failures using 'workaround' solutions to overcome encountered system failures. Participation in the Improvement Science Research Network's (ISRN) Small Troubles, Adaptive Responses (STAR-2++) study aimed to contribute to global and institutional nursing knowledge by identifying and reporting practice environment relationships with direct care clinicians' quality improvement engagement and clinical outcomes in the surgical intensive care, pediatric medical-surgical, and oncology units. By tracking and developing a better understanding of first-order system failures, researchers seek to identify relationships among practice environment, frontline nurse quality improvement engagement, and clinical outcomes in three hospital acute care units. Combining data from 14 participating hospitals furthers global knowledge and understanding of frontline nurses' quality improvement engagement and clinical outcomes.

Methods: Prospective, cross-sectional, multivariate, quantitative research study was conducted. Research was conducted at a large urban 881 bed acute nonprofit tertiary-care hospital in West Texas. Nurses recruited for study participation according to the STAR-2++ study protocol. Unit data was collected from unit locked boxes and entered into a data collection network for aggregated analysis. Purposes were to measure the following study variables: 1) incidence and type of first-order operational failures encountered by direct care registered nurses during their work shift on a clinical unit; 2) associations between staff identified first-order operational failures encountered on the frontline of care delivery and those detected by non-participant observers; and 3) associations among frontline engagement (measurement of detection of operational defects and team vitality study variables), work environment (measurement of culture of patient safety and excellence in work environment study variables), and quality improvement outcomes (measurement of quality improvement activities, quality of care, and job satisfaction study variables).

Results: To be determined.

Conclusions: Study results informed the participating acute care institution of existing system issues leading to first-order operational failures, thus improving patient care provided by frontline nursing staff.