Knowing the difference between health service evaluation, audit and research can be tricky especially for the novice researcher. Put simply, nursing research involves finding the answers to questions about “what nurses should do to help patients,” audit examines “whether nurses are doing this, and if not, why not,” and service evaluation asks about “the effect of nursing care on patient experie...

Historically, nurses have been required to be culturally safe in their practice. (1,2) But now all registered nurses (RNs) must show competency within their scope of practice, including evidence of competence in culturally safe practice. (3) At first, this requirement may appear challenging for nurses working in mental health, given that practice in this area sometimes requires nursing people a...

QUALITY ISSUE Omitting time-critical medications leads to delays in treatment and may result in patient harm. INITIAL ASSESSMENT Published studies show that omission of prescribed medication doses is common. Although most are inconsequential, up to 86% of omitted medications place patients at some risk of harm. SOLUTION Funding was obtained to develop a medication safety package to facilita...

Quality assurance in higher education has been legislated. It is therefore necessary to develop a quality audit system for Nursing Colleges in Gauteng. The process of developing such a system is complex and needs to foster ownership by all the stakeholders. The first step in this process is to conduct a value clarification on quality. The purpose of this article is to explore and describe a val...

Objective: To discuss the experience of developing approaches to measuring the quality of nursing documentation in residential aged care homes. Methods: Three information sources were reviewed to explore approaches in auditing nursing documentation: the current literature, relevant Australian legislative and professional requirements, and organizational nursing documentation practice. Results: ...

Episodes of choking during medication administration to patients with dysphagia prompted a chart audit and caregiver interview to identify system problems that allowed inappropriate drug administration to occur. Sixty elderly patients residing on two patient care areas in a 500-bed complex continuing care facility were studied. The audit explored the actual nursing medication administration met...

BACKGROUND Multi-faceted approaches are generally recognised as the most effective way to support the implementation of evidence into practice. Audit and feedback often constitute one element of a multi-faceted implementation package, alongside other strategies, such as interactive education and facilitated support mechanisms. This paper describes a multi-faceted implementation strategy that us...

In 1993, all 37 private nursing homes in Mid-Staffordshire were invited to take part in this study, and 16 agreed. Over 1 year, a nurse audit facilitator visited these homes to teach staff, and stimulate and assist with audit projects. At the beginning and end of the 12-month period, the residents were assessed by administered questionnaires and by the short Geriatric Depression Scale. Thirteen...

BACKGROUND In recent years there have been concerns regarding the prescribing of antipsychotic drugs to patients with dementia in nursing homes, due to adverse effects, inappropriate indications and insufficient review. Our practice decided to look at this difficult area more closely. AIM The aim of this audit was to assess whether our prescribing of antipsychotic drugs in nursing homes was a...