Prospective Trial of House Staff Time to Response and Intervention in a Surgical Intensive Care Unit: Pager vs. Smartphone.

OBJECTIVE

The objective of the study was to characterize house staff time to response and intervention when notified of a patient care issue by pager vs. smartphone. We hypothesized that smartphones would reduce house staff time to response and intervention.

DESIGN

Prospective study of all electronic communications was conducted between nurses and house staff between September 2015 and October 2015. The 4-week study period was randomly divided into two 2-week study periods where all electronic communications between intensive care unit nurses and intensive care unit house staff were exclusively by smartphone or by pager, respectively. Time of communication initiation, time of house staff response, and time from response to clinical intervention for each communication were recorded. Outcomes are time from nurse contact to house staff response and intervention.

SETTING

Single-center surgical intensive care unit of Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, California, an academic tertiary care and level I trauma center.

PARTICIPANTS

All electronic communications occurring between nurses and house staff in the study unit during the study period were considered. During the study period, 205 nurse-house staff electronic communications occurred, 100 in the phone group and 105 in the pager group.

RESULTS

House staff response to communication time was significantly shorter in the phone group (0.5 [interquartile range = 1.7] vs. 2 [3]min, p < 0.001). Time to house staff intervention after response was also significantly more rapid in the phone group (0.8 [1.7] vs. 1 [2]min, p = 0.003).

CONCLUSIONS

Dedicated clinical smartphones significantly decrease time to house staff response after electronic nursing communications compared with pagers.