An interdisciplinary team approach to evidence-based improvement in family-centered care.

Family-centered care has become an integral part of total patient care in today's healthcare setting. Meeting family needs can be challenging for staff nurses already overwhelmed with escalating patient acuity and ever-increasing technical and documentation burdens. In the year 2000, an Interdisciplinary team in a tertiary hospital in the midwest employed a collaborative process to design and pioneer an award-winning nursing role in family-centered care. This article describes the methods used by this hospital to meet the ever-increasing challenge of family needs integrated into holistic patient care.