1. Infusion Pump Alerts by Time
Use of Smart Pump Data Analysis to Improve Utilization of Safety Features Thomas Kane Ferris State University
Purpose
Intravenous pumps, utilized to deliver medications, have safety features such built into the pump function to alert users to potentially unsafe administration practices. The goals of this project were to identify the level of safety feature utilization, reasons for non-compliance, design of a plan to improve compliance and analyze changes in compliance after the plan is implemented.
Data collected from IV pumps. Medication library reviewed. Analysis utilizing pivot table. Staff survey done.
Medication library incorrect. Peak alerts when pharmacy dosed drugs given. Staff override reasons identified. Override medications identified.
Conduct FMEA and RCA to find reasons the safety features are overridden. Collect and analyze data
Plan for correction and monitoring:
1. Monthly reporting process
2. Library correction
3. Change ordering practices
Act
Plan Do
Study
Results
The percent of alerts, that were overrides prior to the improvement plan was 59.7%. 40% of the total overrides were due to non-pharmacy dosed medication.
The comparison based on percent reveals a 100% improvement in non-pharmacy dosed medication overrides and a reduction from 59.7% to 17.8% in total overrides pre-improvement plan to post-improvement plan.
Infusion Pump Alerts by Time
Conclusion
The percent improvement for non-pharmacy dosed overrides was 100%, and a 41.9% improvement in the total number of over rides.
Continued data analysis and implementation of the full improvement plan will be required to continue to secure the improvements of the use of the Guardrails® safety system.
It is unknown if the improvements were directly due to the improvement plan implementation, or the recent discussions within the project, alerting the nurses to the override issues.