Patients Safety and Discharge Teaching Particularly In Pediatrics

Vol.4  No.3

Year : 2014

Issue : Aug-Oct

Title : Patients Safety and Discharge Teaching Particularly In Pediatrics

Author Name : Laila Muhammad

Synopsis :

Every human experience some sort of illness in his or her life however, some need hospitalization and others don't. Being in hospital is not a pleasant experience for most of the people, since they are there at the mercy of doctors and nurses. Health care professionals are trained to provide safe care to the patients. But ensuring the provision of safe care round the clock is a bit challenging. Hospitals establish several benchmarks to ensure the safety of their clients. There are certain organizations which facilitate hospitals to establish and meet those criteria and JCIA is one of them. Patient safety is one of the vital goals of it. Institute of Medicine (IOM) has defined patient safety in a very simple way, as “the prevention of harm to patients. Emphasis is placed on the system of care delivery that (1) prevents errors; (2) learns from the errors that do occur; and (3) is built on a culture of safety that involves health care professionals, organizations, and patients.” (Patient Safety and Quality: An Evidence-Based Handbook for Nurses, 2008, p.2). Patient safety has a wide scope of practices within it; therefore it has been further classified in clinical and administrative domains. Several clinical indicators are established to analyze the effectiveness of care being provided to the patients. The care does not only include inpatient services but also care to be provided at the time of discharge. Discharge teaching is an essential component of care and safety particularly in pediatric population, as it is high risk population and at a greater risk of chances of errors because they are not the direct recipient of teaching. As teaching is given to their parents or care givers which could create an understanding gap regarding the care to be given at home, medication administration, and when the child would need immediate professional assistance. This paper will focus on the importance of discharge teaching, team involved in the teaching process, components of discharge teaching, an interventional methodology to make the teaching more effective, strategies and recommendations to improve discharge teaching.

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