Nursing data quality is very important because healthcare providers are making decisions based upon the data. The data integrity is important in healthcare because treatment decisions are based upon the data in the charts. Recently someone at work put in the wrong intake and output for a patient and the physician treated the patient as if he was fluid overloaded and in actuality he wasn't. I went back to our paper flowsheet and found the correct entries and put it into the computer charting system accurately. It is important to remember that one wrong keystroke can cause the patient's plan of care to be harmful or wrong and it can also be inaccurate reflection of the patient's status. Accurate and quality data are important in healthcare to diminish mistakes and harm to our patients. In our Hebda book, it states that "data provides the building blocks in the formation of knowledge". This is so true because it is all we have to rely on when treating patients. In order to ensure correct data entry and collection, staff must be educated and proficient in the use of data collection systems. They must also have the knowledge that it is important to accurately reflect the patient's status because if the dat isn't correct, patients may be harmed.
Monday, March 16, 2009
Module 4, Question1
How did the readings influence your perception of your own clinical decision making? How do we reconcile the value of nursing experience with known heuristics and biases used in human decision making?
The readings made me conscious of my clinical decision making because I have the experience and knowledge to take care of critically ill patients, but I haven't "experienced" every situation that may come. I know where to turn for resources when I have a patient with an illness or disease that I haven't heard of or experienced. In the past I have heard that experience is how nurses learn to do a better job and give excellent patient care, but it is important to incorporate evidence-based practice into your clinical practice as well as draw on past experiences. Using previous experience and a clinical decision support system as tools to provide evidence-based care is the ideal way to make important clinical decisions.
Since people usually don't detect their own biases of judgements, this can cause mistakes and misconceptions. If using probability without heuristics or other knowledge, systematic errors can occur. We can reconcile the value of the nursing experience with our known heuristics and biases in human decision making by being aware of our cognitive biases and having knowledge of our internal judgemental heuristics. By making our judgements based on our knowledge, experience, heuristics and biases, we can make better decisions under uncertainty.
Friday, March 6, 2009
Module 3 Blog
In the multiple intelligence test that I took, my results surprised me. I had a tie between musical and logical-mathematical. The one that surprised me was math. I don't really enjoy it, but I do ok in it, so I thought that would be my lowest score. I was also surprised that I scored high in music. I love music, I play the piano and enjoy a good tune, but I don't think of myself as a musician of any sort. Only one point behind was the interpersonal category, which makes sense because I am a nurse and love my job. My lowest score was in spatial-visual. I am not the creative, decorative type of person, although I would love to be. The technologies I need to incorporate to augment my personal learning would be to take more art classes and self-reflective activities. I learn well using numbers, logic, music, rhythm, teamwork and cooperation, so I need to step outside my comfort zone and learn other methods to become more well-rounded.
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