- Email: [email protected]
A Few Parting Thoughts
PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE
A FEW PARTING THOUGHTS
Deena Brecher, MSN, RN, APRN, ACNS-BC, CEN, CPEN, Wilmington, DE
y the time you are reading this, the holiday season will soon be upon us, as will our high-volume seasons in the emergency department. Enterovirus D68 will be a thing of the past, and fingers crossed, we will be gearing up for a mild influenza season. The seasons will have changed, and in a few weeks, we will be changing Emergency Nurses Association (ENA) Presidents as well. It seems as if everything in the world of an emergency nurse is changing. A little more than a year ago, I added to your list of reasons we should change. I talked about changing our attitudes about patient safety. I insisted we start reporting near misses and system failures instead of working around them. I asked each of you to point your finger inward and think about how your own bedside behaviors negatively affect patient safety. Essentially, I asked each of you to think differently about patient safety and to keep your responsibility of keeping patients safe at the top of your mind. So here we are, almost a year later. In this era of outcomes-driven health care, I cannot help but question whether we have made any progress. To be honest, one should have a measurable outcome in mind when starting down the path of improvement. I did not start that way. I understood we had a problem on our hands of epidemic proportions with a moving target. The actual number of patient deaths as a result of errors in health care is one that can only be estimated. Some estimate it is about 400,000. Others have placed that number at 2 million. Breaking
B
Deena Brecher is President of the Emergency Nurses Association. For correspondence, write: Deena Brecher, MSN, RN, APRN, ACNS-BC, CEN, CPEN, Emergency Nurses Association, 915 Lee St, Des Plaines, IL 60016; E-mail: [email protected]. J Emerg Nurs 2014;40:525. 0099-1767 Copyright © 2014 Published by Elsevier Inc. on behalf of Emergency Nurses Association. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jen.2014.09.008
November 2014
VOLUME 40 • ISSUE 6
down that number to preventable deaths in the emergency department is also challenging. But ask an emergency nurse if they happen, and virtually every one will say yes. One of the most important things to remember when identifying opportunities to improve patient safety is that we are all human. And as humans, we will all make mistakes. In your career, chances are you have made many mistakes you are unaware of. Fortunately, most of these mistakes did not harm the patient. How do we get to zero preventable errors? First, we need to recognize we are not perfect. Second, we need to admit when we make a mistake, report it, and learn from it. Third, we have to actively seek out flaws in the systems we work in and report them. Fourth, we must be leaders and experts in performance improvement initiatives, working to design systems and processes that limit the opportunities for human error. Finally, we must never give up the mission and commitment to safe practice and safe care. As ENA President, I have had an incredible opportunity to reach out to all 40,000 of you and to combine our collective wisdom, experience, and knowledge and put them to great use. How can we harness the incredible passion we share for our profession and work to stop the epidemic of errors in our departments? We do it together, as a profession. Zero preventable errors for every emergency department in this country, on this Earth, is the goal. I have heard from many of you about the things you have changed and the differences you have made in our war on preventable errors. Some nurses shared stories that had to do with individual behaviors. Others shared stories about how they championed sweeping system changes to keep their patients safe. Success stories abound about emergency nurses positively affecting the safety of the patients they care for. Our mission to abolish preventable errors in our departments does not end on December 31, 2014. We cannot afford to go back to the way we were on January 1, 2014. We need to continue to make patient safety something we think about each time we interact with a patient. We need to stop the bullying and start being each other’s wingman. We can and will reach the goal of zero preventable errors in the emergency department. It is going to take all of us, working together, to get there. And I beg of you, do not stop advocating for safe patient care until we do get there. Until the day we can be sure every patient in the emergency department is cared for in the safest place in health care, we must keep reaching for zero preventable errors in the emergency department. Not only are our patients and their families counting on us, but I am as well.
WWW.JENONLINE.ORG
525
A FEW PARTING THOUGHTS
Deena Brecher, MSN, RN, APRN, ACNS-BC, CEN, CPEN, Wilmington, DE
y the time you are reading this, the holiday season will soon be upon us, as will our high-volume seasons in the emergency department. Enterovirus D68 will be a thing of the past, and fingers crossed, we will be gearing up for a mild influenza season. The seasons will have changed, and in a few weeks, we will be changing Emergency Nurses Association (ENA) Presidents as well. It seems as if everything in the world of an emergency nurse is changing. A little more than a year ago, I added to your list of reasons we should change. I talked about changing our attitudes about patient safety. I insisted we start reporting near misses and system failures instead of working around them. I asked each of you to point your finger inward and think about how your own bedside behaviors negatively affect patient safety. Essentially, I asked each of you to think differently about patient safety and to keep your responsibility of keeping patients safe at the top of your mind. So here we are, almost a year later. In this era of outcomes-driven health care, I cannot help but question whether we have made any progress. To be honest, one should have a measurable outcome in mind when starting down the path of improvement. I did not start that way. I understood we had a problem on our hands of epidemic proportions with a moving target. The actual number of patient deaths as a result of errors in health care is one that can only be estimated. Some estimate it is about 400,000. Others have placed that number at 2 million. Breaking
B
Deena Brecher is President of the Emergency Nurses Association. For correspondence, write: Deena Brecher, MSN, RN, APRN, ACNS-BC, CEN, CPEN, Emergency Nurses Association, 915 Lee St, Des Plaines, IL 60016; E-mail: [email protected]. J Emerg Nurs 2014;40:525. 0099-1767 Copyright © 2014 Published by Elsevier Inc. on behalf of Emergency Nurses Association. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jen.2014.09.008
November 2014
VOLUME 40 • ISSUE 6
down that number to preventable deaths in the emergency department is also challenging. But ask an emergency nurse if they happen, and virtually every one will say yes. One of the most important things to remember when identifying opportunities to improve patient safety is that we are all human. And as humans, we will all make mistakes. In your career, chances are you have made many mistakes you are unaware of. Fortunately, most of these mistakes did not harm the patient. How do we get to zero preventable errors? First, we need to recognize we are not perfect. Second, we need to admit when we make a mistake, report it, and learn from it. Third, we have to actively seek out flaws in the systems we work in and report them. Fourth, we must be leaders and experts in performance improvement initiatives, working to design systems and processes that limit the opportunities for human error. Finally, we must never give up the mission and commitment to safe practice and safe care. As ENA President, I have had an incredible opportunity to reach out to all 40,000 of you and to combine our collective wisdom, experience, and knowledge and put them to great use. How can we harness the incredible passion we share for our profession and work to stop the epidemic of errors in our departments? We do it together, as a profession. Zero preventable errors for every emergency department in this country, on this Earth, is the goal. I have heard from many of you about the things you have changed and the differences you have made in our war on preventable errors. Some nurses shared stories that had to do with individual behaviors. Others shared stories about how they championed sweeping system changes to keep their patients safe. Success stories abound about emergency nurses positively affecting the safety of the patients they care for. Our mission to abolish preventable errors in our departments does not end on December 31, 2014. We cannot afford to go back to the way we were on January 1, 2014. We need to continue to make patient safety something we think about each time we interact with a patient. We need to stop the bullying and start being each other’s wingman. We can and will reach the goal of zero preventable errors in the emergency department. It is going to take all of us, working together, to get there. And I beg of you, do not stop advocating for safe patient care until we do get there. Until the day we can be sure every patient in the emergency department is cared for in the safest place in health care, we must keep reaching for zero preventable errors in the emergency department. Not only are our patients and their families counting on us, but I am as well.
WWW.JENONLINE.ORG
525