a standardized shift handover protocol: improving nurses’ safe practice in the area of medication and intravenous line in intensive care units

a standardized shift handover protocol: improving nurses’ safe practice in the area of medication and intravenous line in intensive care units     malekzadeh j [1] , etezadi jam t* [2] , mazlom sr [3] ,taseiri ar4     received: 21 apr, 2013 accepted: 25 jun, 2013   abstract   background & aims : poor communication among health care providers includes risk factors that should always take into account in monitoring of medication errors and intravenous lines. information exchange happens repeatedly among healthcare providers. an instance of such communication and exchange of information that plays a pivotal role in improving patient safety is during the nursing shift handovers. they should be done in a standard procedure, and they should be documented to improve the performance in the areas of safety and preventing medication errors and intravenous lines. this study was accomplished to investigate the effect of a standardized shift handover protocol on the safe performance of nurses in the areas of care of intravenous lines and medications.   materials & methods : this was a quasi-experimental, one group pretest/posttest study on 56 nurses working in intensive care unit in qhaem hospital who were conveniently selected. the safety performance level of nursing care were evaluated before and after implementation of written guideline using self-structured checklist of performance evaluation of nursing care. validity and reliability of this instrument was determined by content validity index and inter rater reliability(r=0.95).   results: study findings revealed that nurses’ mean score on the safe practice evaluation checklist increased significantly (p<0.001). wilcoxon test showed that there is a significant difference in the two areas related to the nursing care of medication and intravenous lines.   conclusion: development of a rule-based approach, comprehensive and practical standard protocol to transmit crucial and relevant information related to the patient care will improve safe performances of nurses in the area of medication and intravenous lines nursing care.   key words: shift handover, patient safety, nursing care, intensive care unit, medication errors   address: mashhad school of nursing and mid midwifery, eben- sina st.,mashhad, iran.   tel: (+985118598019)   email: [email protected]   [1] .instructor,medical surgical nursing department, nursing and midwifery school , mashhad university of medical science,mashhad, iran.  [2] . msc in nursing, nursing and midwifery school , mashhad university of medical science,mashhad, iran.  (corresponding author)   [3] .ph.d. in nursing, , nursing and midwifery school , mashhad university of medical science,mashhad, iran