Introduction
This assignment focuses on how it is possible to design and implement an evidence-based safety program that will be based on the identified healthcare entity. Since it has been determined that the acute care hospital suffers from infections and patient falls that are safety issues, it is reasonable to offer a program that will address these phenomena. This research paper will demonstrate that Jean Watson’s theoretical framework is suitable because it mentions that education should be a focus of an evidence-based safety program to minimize patient falls and infections. Specific comments will also be offered on how to ensure the sustainability of the program’s expected outcomes.
Identifying a Safety Theory
A theoretical framework is essential for every quality, safety, or change program. It is so because a theory offers basic knowledge regarding how and whether it is possible to achieve expected outcomes. As for the given assignment, it will focus on Jean Watson’s Human Caring Theory as a guideline to design an evidence-based program. The following paragraphs will comment on this theory and justify its use for the case under consideration.
To begin with, one should describe the basics of the given theoretical framework. According to Wei and Watson (2019), “Watson’s Human Caring Theory is widely used to guide nursing education, practice, and research internationally” (p. 17). Since the framework focuses on these issues, it is possible to mention that it promotes improved safety within the healthcare environment. One should admit that education for both medical professionals and patients deserves more attention because it ensures that the stakeholders have sufficient knowledge to improve their safety.
Simultaneously, it is worth mentioning that the theoretical framework implies a few significant aspects. Firstly, Wei et al. (2021) state that loving-kindness for self and others is significant in healthcare entities. It is so because this issue allows for establishing productive relationships between medical professionals and their patients. Secondly, a moment of caring is also significant since it stands for connections between two subjective minds, which allows healthcare workers to understand patients’ personal experiences (Wei et al., 2021). These two aspects are mutually significant because they create trustworthy relationships that are positive for patient safety and quality of care.
The information above demonstrates that Watson’s theory can support the implementation of the safety program, and specific aspects prove this thought. It was mentioned in Part Two assignment that patient falls and infections are typical because healthcare settings do not provide patients with sufficient safety. In this case, it is reasonable to invest in medical professionals and patients’ education to help them mitigate the inefficiencies of this environment.
Simultaneously, it is evident that high safety standards can only be achieved if patients and medical professionals collaborate efficiently. That is why loving-kindness and the moment of caring are significant phenomena that contribute to establishing productive and trustworthy relationships between the stakeholders. This information means that the theory under review offers the essential aspects to consider while designing the specific program.
Even though the information above has commented on the benefits of Watson’s theory, it is rational to provide scientific evidence that supports its use. Firstly, Wei and Watson (2019) argue that addressing education leads to many advantages, including patients’ improved psychological health, nurse job satisfaction, and others. If these phenomena are present, it will be easier for the stakeholders to address and mitigate the safety issues. Secondly, research findings demonstrate that promoting loving-kindness leads to a positive effect on the brain, making individuals more engaged in safety activities (Wei et al., 2021).
When people are in good spirits, they are less negligent regarding their health and well-being, which encourages safe behaviors. Finally, the moment of caring and implied trustworthy relationships are useful since they regulate “the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenocortical (HPA) axis and central oxytocin pathways” (Wei et al., 2021, p. 132). These pathways improve immune systems and strengthen resistance to illness, which is essential to mitigate infections. These data demonstrate that there is scientific reasoning behind using Watson’s Human Caring Theory for creating a safety program.
Designing the Evidence-Based Safety Program
In the beginning, it is necessary to mention that the following safety program will focus on addressing injurious falls and contract infections since they significantly affect the healthcare entity under analysis. This section will present specific steps that can be really applied in practice to address the issues under investigation. Furthermore, credible evidence from scholarly studies will appear to support and justify the program design and implementation.
Since it has been mentioned that Watson’s framework draws significant attention to education, this aspect is an integral part of the proposed safety program. However, one should admit that no statistically significant evidence would demonstrate the effectiveness of educational interventions in isolation. That is why it is reasonable to use education as a part of comprehensive approaches, and the study by Cheng et al. (2018) offers a useful example.
The scientists offer statistically significant evidence stating that education interventions combined with risk assessment and exercises effectively reduce patient falls (Cheng et al., 2018). It means that addressing the phenomenon under analysis is possible through educating medical professionals and patients, addressing the environmental risks within the healthcare setting, and encouraging patients to participate in regular physical exercise.
One should admit that establishing productive and trustworthy relationships between patients and medical professionals is also essential for addressing injurious falls. That is why Vonnes and Wolf (2017) argue that encouraging patients and their family members to participate in fall reduction activities is a practical approach. The evidence by Vonnes and Wolf (2017) demonstrates that healthcare professionals should organize collaborative communication sessions to engage patients in affecting their health. In addition to that, one can mention that implementing the multifactorial interventions that have been described above also leads to establishing good relationships between the stakeholders (Cheng et al., 2018).
It is so because when individuals see that they are offered multiple interventions, they typically start feeling more trustworthy to their caregivers. Thus, the information above has demonstrated that the proposed program should rely on patient and medical professionals’ education with additional interventions and engaging patients in discussing their safety measures.
Furthermore, it is reasonable to design the program to address infections in the acute care hospital. This problem is severe in the industry because numerous factors contribute to it. According to Fernando et al. (2017), they are the complexity of medical care, a specific environment suitable for infection spread, overuse of antimicrobials, and others. That is why a particular implementation program is required to address this issue, and education should be its basis.
Fernando et al. (2017) offer sufficient evidence to demonstrate that education should refer to environmental control, antibiotic use, and hospital cleaning measures. It means that medical professionals should be well experienced and educated to know how they can minimize the spread of infections across the healthcare entity. However, it is impossible to mention that patients are not responsible for the spread of such diseases. Evidence by Read et al. (2020) gives the same importance to “basic infection prevention principles such as hand hygiene, isolation precautions, use of personal protective equipment, and cleaning” (p. 227). This information demonstrates that both medical professionals and patients can improve their safety within the hospital.
It is also rational to comment on why it is necessary to invest in establishing a trustworthy relationship between healthcare professionals and patients to address the safety issue of infections. As the information above has explained, the two stakeholder groups can influence the case, meaning that their collaborative efforts can produce more positive results. Fernando et al. (2017) support this claim by mentioning that infection prevention measures are more successful if they are effectively communicated to patients. It denotes that productive cooperation should be present within the healthcare entity to ensure that the preventive steps are going to achieve the desired goals (Fernando et al., 2017). This program component conforms with Watson’s theory that admits the necessity of trustworthy relationships between the stakeholders.
The information above demonstrates that the safety program in the proposed medical establishment should rely on two specific steps. They are the educational intervention and establishing trustworthy relationships between patients and healthcare professionals. Even though the program design is simple, sufficient evidence from scholarly and peer-reviewed studies justifies the selection of these measures. That is why the following step is to comment on the program’s expected outcomes.
Expected Outcomes
It is not a surprise that the designed safety program focuses on achieving specific outcomes, and they differ depending on which safety measure is under consideration. When it comes to patient falls and involved injuries, the outcomes relate to these events’ occurrence. The study by Cheng et al. (2018) states that the goals of any fall prevention intervention refer to the number of fallers and the length of follow-up periods. Simultaneously, Vonnes and Wolf (2017) argue that their measure focuses on falls and the “injuries sustained as a result of the fall” (p. 2). It is worth mentioning that the two studies’ authors aim at reducing the occurrence of these adverse events within their medical settings. That is why it is reasonable that the designed safety program also mentions that the expected outcomes refer to decreasing the number of patient falls and subsequent injuries.
Simultaneously, the proposed steps also aim at achieving specific targets regarding contractual infections in the healthcare entity under consideration. According to Fernando et al. (2017), a useful outcome measure relates to infection rates within the medical setting. It denotes that any preventive actions should be designed to reduce the number of infectious disease cases. Since it has been described that hospital cleaning and environmental control play a significant role in the spread of infections, another outcome should draw attention to these phenomena.
This claim refers to the necessity to limit the presence and transmission of various bacteria and other harmful organisms with the help of disinfection measures (Fernando et al., 2017). That is why the designed safety program also aims at achieving these outcomes, including the decreased number of hospital-acquired infections by patients and improved disinfection procedures. Once the specific goals have been defined with the help of scientific evidence, it is required to comment on how to ensure their sustainability, which will be discussed below.
In the beginning, it is worth articulating the meaning of sustainability. According to Russo et al. (2019), this term stands for “the capacity of healthcare systems to ensure the long-term health and well-being of communities” (p. 1). For the purpose of this research, sustainability refers to specific measures that should be taken to ensure that the proposed program steps provide patients’ health with long-term benefits. Thus, the first sustainability action relates to empowering patients and their abilities. The reasoning behind this step is that these individuals are “important resources for co-creating health value together with operators” (Russo et al., 2019, p. 1).
Empowering refers to promoting health literacy, motivating patient participation, encouraging communication within the healthcare entity, and others. The necessity to engage patients and their families in safety activities has already been described above. Thus, this step denotes that sick persons will become active stakeholders, suggesting that their participation will help achieve and preserve positive outcomes.
Another step to ensure sustainability relates to decreasing administrative processes. Pekar (2019) explains that modern healthcare organizations are forced to deal with numerous tasks, including administrative, technical, medical, and others, that are energy-consuming for the entity. That is why it is necessary to find ways to minimize these processes to ensure that medical professionals spend more time working with patients. Thus, the decision is to promote leadership and flexibility among healthcare workers (Pekar, 2019).
This step will ensure that nurses, physicians, and others will have sufficient competence and autonomy to make timely decisions to promote sustainability. Furthermore, flexibility implies that the healthcare entity will not need to have many supervisors to check whether medical professionals manage to abide by the designed program. It is so because medical workers will be provided with the autonomy to hold responsibility for their actions.
Conclusion
This assignment has presented a theoretical framework that supports the design and implementation of the evidence-based safety program. Watson’s Human Caring Theory has been selected as a guiding safety theory. It focuses on promoting education and establishing trustworthy relationships between patients and healthcare professionals. Based on these phenomena, the assignment offers a specific evidence-based safety program to improve the safety outcomes of injurious falls and contractual infections in the selected healthcare entity. The proposed interventions focus on implementing education interventions with supplementary measures and creating productive relationships by involving patients in the care delivery process.
Furthermore, the assignment has articulated that the reduced numbers of patient falls with injuries and contractual infections within the healthcare entity are the program expected outcomes. Scientific evidence has also been located to comment on how it is possible to ensure sustainability. Firstly, a useful option is to empower patients by improving their health literacy, promoting their participation in care delivery, motivating their communication with medical professionals, and others. Secondly, it is reasonable to reduce the number of administrative processes in the healthcare entity to ensure that medical professionals draw more attention to working with patients. These steps are considered useful for ensuring the sustainability of the designed program.
References
Cheng, P., Tan, L., Ning, P., Li, L., Gao, Y., Wu, Y., Schwebel, D. C., Chu, H., Yin, H., & Hu, G. (2018). Comparative effectiveness of published interventions for elderly fall prevention: A systematic review and network meta-analysis. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 15(498), 1-14. Web.
Fernando, S. A., Gray, T. J., & Gottlieb, T. (2017). Healthcare-acquired infections: Prevention strategies. Internal Medicine Journal, 47, 1341-1351. Web.
Pekar, F. (2019). Future challenges towards sustainable healthcare. Scientific Paper of Silesian University of Technology, Organization, and Management, (141), 303-317. Web.
Read, M. E., Olson, A. J., & Calderwood, M. S. (2020). Front-line education by infection preventionists helps reduce Clostridioides difficile infections. American Journal of Infection Control, 48(2), 227-229. Web.
Russo, G., Tartaglione, A. M., & Cavacece, Y. (2019). Empowering patients to co-create a sustainable healthcare value. Sustainability, 11, 1-20. Web.
Vonnes, C., & Wolf, D. (2017). Fall risk and prevention agreement: Engaging patients and families with a partnership for patient safety. BMJ Open Quality, 6(2), 1-4. Web.
Wei, H., Hardin, S. R., & Watson, J. (2021). A unitary caring science resilience-building model: Unifying the human caring theory and research-informed psychology and neuroscience evidence. International Journal of Nursing Sciences, 8(1), 130-135. Web.
Wei, H., & Watson, J. (2019). Healthcare interprofessional team members’ perspectives on human caring: A directed content analysis study. International Journal of Nursing Sciences, 6(1), 17-23. Web.