Meng'anyi Lucy W, Omondi Lilian A, Muiva Margaret N
Kenyatta National Hospital, P.O. Box 20723, Nairobi, 00202 Kenya.
School of Nursing Sciences, University of Nairobi, P.O. Box 19676, Nairobi, 00200 Kenya.
BMC Nurs. 2017 Jul 25;16:41. doi: 10.1186/s12912-017-0235-1. eCollection 2017.
Alarms in the critical areas are an important component of most of the machines as they alert nurses on the change in the patients' condition. Most patients in the critical care units cannot speak for themselves hence cannot pinpoint when their condition changes. It is therefore important to assess the nurses' interventions when managing clinical alarms. The purpose of this study was to assess interventions employed by nurses in the management of clinical alarms in the care of patients in the Critical Care Unit (CCU), Kenyatta National Hospital (KNH).
A descriptive cross sectional study was carried out in the month of June 2014 where 87 nurses were recruited as study respondents. KNH/ University of Nairobi (UoN) Ethics and Research committee approved the research. A structured self administered questionnaire was used to collect data. The questionnaire contained some questions in a Likert scale in relation to the actions the nurses would take in the management of clinical alarms and some on whether policies on alarm management existed in the hospital, if they filled alarm checklists and how often and the types of alarms they would respond to first.
The respondents' responses were scored and from the results it was clear that there were some gaps in the management of clinical alarms. Majority of the nurses reported that they respond to alarms of all durations and do not fill alarm checklists as neither alarm checklists nor protocols are provided. From the findings there was a statistically significant association ( = 0.06) between age and whether the respondents assessed the cause of the alarm beep.
Respondents in this study respond to alarms of all durations in contrast to other studies where the findings indicate that nurses respond to alarms for different reasons, not just that the alarm sounds. Majority of the respondents scored averagely on the questions on whether they carry out most of the interventions or actions. This is inline with previous studies which have shown that healthcare personnel respond to alarms depending on the patient's physiological status.
Nurses in the unit carry out the standard nursing interventions on clinical alarms and, respond to alarms of all durations and do not fill alarm checklists. Alarm protocols should therefore be developed in the hospital, the nurses should be trained on management of clinical alarms and more nurses employed.
关键区域的警报是大多数设备的重要组成部分，因为它们能提醒护士患者病情的变化。重症监护病房的大多数患者无法自行表达，因此无法确定自己病情何时发生变化。所以，评估护士在处理临床警报时的干预措施很重要。本研究的目的是评估肯尼亚肯雅塔国家医院（KNH）重症监护病房（CCU）护士在护理患者时处理临床警报所采用的干预措施。
2014年6月进行了一项描述性横断面研究，招募了87名护士作为研究对象。KNH/内罗毕大学（UoN）伦理与研究委员会批准了该研究。使用结构化的自填式问卷收集数据。问卷包含一些李克特量表形式的问题，涉及护士在处理临床警报时会采取的行动，以及关于医院是否存在警报管理政策、他们是否填写警报清单、填写频率以及他们首先会响应的警报类型等问题。
对受访者的回答进行了评分，结果表明在临床警报管理方面存在一些差距。大多数护士报告说，他们会对所有时长的警报做出响应，并且不填写警报清单，因为既没有提供警报清单也没有相关规程。研究结果显示，年龄与受访者是否评估警报声的原因之间存在统计学上的显著关联（P = 0.06）。
本研究中的受访者会对所有时长的警报做出响应，这与其他研究不同，其他研究结果表明护士因不同原因对警报做出响应，而不仅仅是因为警报声响起。大多数受访者在关于他们是否执行大多数干预措施或行动的问题上得分中等。这与之前的研究一致，之前的研究表明医护人员根据患者的生理状态对警报做出响应。
该科室的护士对临床警报执行标准护理干预措施，对所有时长的警报做出响应，且不填写警报清单。因此，医院应制定警报规程，对护士进行临床警报管理培训，并雇佣更多护士。
