Improve Patient Satisfaction
Fion Kung and Carmen Valdez, University of South Florida College of Nursing
Purpose
Results
 Nurse leaders
The purpose of this Quality Improvement Project is to improve
patients satisfaction in the pain management and medication
communication categories. Our plan is to educate the nursing
staff about the importance of communicating the purpose of
medications and its side effects to each patient. Also, we want
to educate the nursing staff about constantly updating the
whiteboard in each patient’s room with their pain medication.
 Nurse Educators
 Charge Nurses
 Staff Nurses (RNs, LPNs)
 Nurse Techs
Measures
 The results of this Quality Improvement project will be
measured by using the Hospital Consumers Assessment of
Healthcare Providers and System survey, also known as,
Patient Satisfaction Survey.
Background
Issue
According to HCAPS Hospital Survey (2014), many patients
report that nurses are not communicating the indication of
their medications and side effects. They also report that their
pain management is not being addressed.
 Only 50% of the patients know about the indications and
side effects of the medications that they are taking.
 Only 48% of patients state that their pain was addressed.
Why implementation is necessary?
 It’s important to address this issue because it affects the
hospital’s reputation as well reimbursement.
 According to Aiken et al., high patient satisfaction may
increase recommendation of the hospital (2012).
We will use the Quality Improvement Survey to find out if
nurses are explaining the indication and side effects of the
medications that are given to the patients, as well as the use of
the whiteboards to keep patients updated about their pain
medication.
Process Improvement
 Our idea is to educate nurses about ways to improve
patient-nurse communication.
References
 Aiken, L., Sermeus, W., Heede, K., Sloane, D., Busse, R.,
Improvement Tools/Methods
Plan: Our plan is to increase patient satisfaction in pain
management and medication communication by the next
survey quarter. Our goal is to increase the percentage in pain
management from 48% to 75%. Also, we want to increase the
percentage of medication communication from 50% to 75%.
Do: In this project, we need everyone in the unit to be
involved. This includes nurse leaders, nurse educators,
charge nurses, RNs, LPNs, and nurse techs. We created a
Quality Improvement Survey to evaluate how often nurses
are communicating the medication indication and its side
effects to patients. In the survey, we also asked how often
nurses are using the whiteboards to keep patients updated
about their pain medication.
Study: Our survey revealed that not all nurses are updating
the whiteboards with the pain medication in the patients’
rooms. Also, not all the nurses are communicating the
indications and side effects of the medications to the patients.
Acts: Nurses should be more consistent about updating the
whiteboard of each patient after pain medication is given. In
addition, nurses should be more consistent in explaining the
indication of medications and its side effects to patients.
Team Members
Mckee, M., ... Lee, A. (2012). Patient safety, satisfaction, and
quality of hospital care: cross sectional surveys of nurses and
patients in 12 countries in Europe and the United States.
BMJ:British Medical Journal, 344: 1717
 Al-Abri, R & Al-Balushi, A. (2014). Patient Satisfaction Survey
as a Tool Towards Quality Improvement. Oman Medical Journal,
29, (1): 3-7
 Brigham and Women's Hospital. (2013). Improving Our Patient
Satisfaction. Retrieved from
http://www.brighamandwomens.org/about_bwh/quality/improving.
aspx
 CAHPS Hospital Survey. (2014). Retrieved from
http://www.hcahpsonline.org
 Kheraj, R., Tewani, S., Ketwaroo, Gyanprakash., Leffler, D.
(2012). Quality Improvement in Gastroenterology Clinical
Practice. Clinical Gastroenterology and Hepatology, 10(12):13051314.
 Linn, A., Weert, J., Dijk, L., Horne, R., Smit, E. (2012). The
values of nurses’ tailored communication when discussing
medicines: Exploring the relationship between satisfaction,
beliefs and adherence. Journal of Health Psychology, 19 (7), doi:
10.1177/1359105314539529
 Otani, K., Herrmann, P., Kurz, R. (2011). Improving patient
satisfaction in hospital care settings. The Royal Society Medicine
Journals, 24: 163-169, doi:10.1258/hsmr.2011.011008
 Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. (2012). Improving Patient
Experience in the Inpatient Setting: A Case Study of Three
Hospitals. Retrieved from
http://www.rwjf.org/content/dam/farm/reports/issue_briefs/2012/r
wjf72585
Florida Hospital of Tampa
 We will educate the nurses about the importance of
explaining the indication of the medications that the patients
are taking as well as the side effects and adverse effects.
Also, we will educate nurses the importance of updating the
whiteboards after each dose of pain medication.
 According to Linn, Weert, Dijk, Horne & Smit (2014),
communicating the indication of the medication and its side
effects leads to higher patient satisfaction.
 The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (2012) found that
using the whiteboards to update patients about their pain
medications resulted in higher patient satisfaction. In addition,
patients felt that their pain management was a priority to the
nurses.
Limitations / Lessons Learned
Some barriers that we might face are:
 Involvement of everyone in the implementation
• Our goal is to get every nurse in the unit to
participate in implementing these changes.
• Nurse techs may be educated about this
implementation so that they don’t accidently erase
the time that the patient is getting the next dose of
pain medication.
 Lack of consistency among the nursing staff
• For better results, this implementation needs to be
carried out consistently.