Vanderbilt University School of Nursing, 461 21st Ave. South, Nashville, TN 37240, United States.
Int J Nurs Stud. 2018 Jun;82:113-120. doi: 10.1016/j.ijnurstu.2018.03.017. Epub 2018 Mar 27.
The majority of interruption research has focused on the undesirable effects of interruptions, especially related to errors during medication tasks. However, there may be times when interruptions result in positive effects by providing new information to a situation or preventing an error. The study of nurses' responses to interruptions is limited. Since interruptions cannot (and possibly should not) be avoided, a reasonable method for handling interruptions might be to learn how best to prepare for and manage interruption-prone situations.
The purpose of this study was to examine nurses' responses to interruptions and explore contextual factors that influence interruption management during medication tasks. This is a secondary analysis of an original study aimed at describing interruptions and nurses' responses to interruptions during routine nursing work on medical-surgical units.
This descriptive study was conducted in 5 medical and/or surgical units at 2 acute care facilities in the southern United States, during weekday shifts.
Twenty registered nurses participated in the study.
The researcher observed nurse participants for at least 4.5 h during routine nursing work. Observation data were collected using time and motion software. Questionnaires were used to collect organizational, unit, and nurse level data. Interruptions during medication tasks were isolated and described as a secondary analysis.
Approximately 39% of medication tasks were interrupted. Following an interruption, nurses were more likely to suspend the medication task to attend to the interruption task (51.1%) or multitask (40.3%) than delay responding to the interruption until the medication task was complete (12.6%). Several characteristics of the interruption task, including task type, source, method, and communication intent were associated with nurses' responses at the level of statistical significance.
The findings of this study reveal that nurses are interrupted frequently during medication tasks. The range of nurses' responses to interruptions was surprising in relation to the frequency with which nurses accepted the interruption task and the infrequency of delay responses. Additional study of nurses' responses to interruptions during medication tasks and the effect of different responses on patient safety outcomes is indicated.
大多数中断研究都集中在中断的不良影响上，特别是与药物治疗任务期间的错误有关。然而，有时中断可能会产生积极影响，为情况提供新信息或防止错误发生。对护士对中断的反应的研究是有限的。由于中断不能（也可能不应该）避免，因此处理中断的合理方法可能是学习如何最好地准备和管理易中断的情况。
本研究旨在考察护士对中断的反应，并探讨影响药物治疗任务中中断管理的环境因素。这是对一项原始研究的二次分析，该研究旨在描述在医疗外科病房的日常护理工作中中断和护士对中断的反应。
这是一项在美国南部的 2 家急性护理机构的 5 个医疗和/或外科病房进行的描述性研究，在工作日班次进行。
20 名注册护士参加了这项研究。
研究人员在常规护理工作期间至少观察护士参与者 4.5 小时。使用时间和运动软件收集观察数据。使用问卷收集组织、单位和护士层面的数据。对药物治疗任务中的中断进行隔离，并进行二次分析。
大约 39%的药物治疗任务被中断。中断后，护士更有可能暂停药物治疗任务来处理中断任务（51.1%）或同时处理多项任务（40.3%），而不是等到药物治疗任务完成后再响应中断（12.6%）。中断任务的几个特征，包括任务类型、来源、方法和沟通意图，与护士在统计学上显著的反应水平相关。
这项研究的结果表明，护士在药物治疗任务中经常被中断。护士对中断的反应范围令人惊讶，因为护士接受中断任务的频率很高，而延迟响应的频率却很低。需要进一步研究护士在药物治疗任务中对中断的反应以及不同反应对患者安全结果的影响。
