Many hospitalists report daily interruptions as one of the largest areas of frustrations, according to the report. Interruptions force people to quickly switch between tasks, which leads to a higher chance of errors since switching tasks requires brain processes that are not instantaneous.
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Consequently, patient care may be compromised when hospitalists are subject to “task-switching,” according to the report.
Although Dr. Whitcomb says implementing “no interruption zones” may not be feasible in the fast-paced hospital setting, he suggests five practices that could decrease the amount of interruptions.
• Unit-based staffing to centralize patients
• Multidisciplinary rounding
• Have nurses send pages in batches
• Structure nighttime rounds for non-urgent matters
• Create urgency levels of paging so a physician knows whether an immediate response is necessary or not.
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