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Impact of Interruption Frequency on Nurses' Performance, Satisfaction, and Cognition During Patient-Controlled Analgesia Use in the Simulated Setting

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Date Issued:
2015
Abstract/Description:
Problem: Interruption during medication administration is a significant patient safety concern within health care, especially during the administration of high risk medications in nursing. Patient-controlled analgesia (PCA) devices are frequently associated with adverse events and have a four-fold increased risk of patient injury compared to non-PCA related adverse events. While the nature and frequency of interruptions have been established for nurses' medication processes, the impact of interruption frequency on nurses' PCA interaction has not been fully measured or described.Purpose: The purposes of this study were to quantify the impact of interruption frequency on registered nurses' (RN) performance, satisfaction, and cognitive workload during PCA interaction, and to determine nurses' perceptions of the impact of interruption frequency.Methods: This study employed a mixed-method design. First, an experimental repeated measures design was used to quantify the impact of interruption frequency on a purposive sample of nine medical-surgical RNs. The RNs completed PCA programming tasks in a simulated laboratory nursing environment for each of four conditions where interruption frequency was pre-determined. Four established human factors usability measures were completed for each of the four test conditions. The research questions were answered using repeated measures analysis of variance with (RM-ANOVA), McNamar's test, and Friedman's test. After each experiment, semi-structured interviews were used to collect data that were analyzed using inductive qualitative content analysis to determine RNs' perceptions of the impact of interruption frequency. Results: Results of the RM-ANOVA were significant for the main effect of interruption frequency on efficiency F(3,24)=9.592, p = .000. McNemar's test did not show significance for the impact of interruption frequency on effectiveness (accuracy). Friedman test showed participant satisfaction was significantly impacted by interruption frequency (x2=9.47, df=3, p=0.024). Friedman test showed no significance for the main effect of interruption frequency on cognitive workload scores by condition type (x2=1.88, df=3, p=0.599). Results of the qualitative content analysis revealed two main categories to describe nurses' perception of interruption frequency: the nature of interruptions and nurses' reaction to the interrupted work environment.Discussion/Implications: The results suggested that interruption frequency significantly affected task completion time and satisfaction for participants but not participant accuracy or cognitive workload. A high error rate during PCA programming tasks indicated the need to evaluate the conditions in which RNs complete PCA programming as each error presents potential risk of patient harm. RNs' described the impact of interruption frequency as having a negative impact on the work environment and subsequently implement compensating strategies to counterbalance interruptions. RNs' perceived that patient safety was negatively impacted by frequent interruption. RNs experienced negative intrapersonal consequences as a results of frequent interruption. Additional study is needed to better understand the impact of interruption frequency on RNs' performance accuracy and cognitive workload.
Title: Impact of Interruption Frequency on Nurses' Performance, Satisfaction, and Cognition During Patient-Controlled Analgesia Use in the Simulated Setting.
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Name(s): Campoe, Kristi, Author
Talbert, Steven, Committee Chair
Sole, Mary Lou, Committee Member
Andrews, Diane, Committee Member
Jentsch, Florian, Committee Member
University of Central Florida, Degree Grantor
Type of Resource: text
Date Issued: 2015
Publisher: University of Central Florida
Language(s): English
Abstract/Description: Problem: Interruption during medication administration is a significant patient safety concern within health care, especially during the administration of high risk medications in nursing. Patient-controlled analgesia (PCA) devices are frequently associated with adverse events and have a four-fold increased risk of patient injury compared to non-PCA related adverse events. While the nature and frequency of interruptions have been established for nurses' medication processes, the impact of interruption frequency on nurses' PCA interaction has not been fully measured or described.Purpose: The purposes of this study were to quantify the impact of interruption frequency on registered nurses' (RN) performance, satisfaction, and cognitive workload during PCA interaction, and to determine nurses' perceptions of the impact of interruption frequency.Methods: This study employed a mixed-method design. First, an experimental repeated measures design was used to quantify the impact of interruption frequency on a purposive sample of nine medical-surgical RNs. The RNs completed PCA programming tasks in a simulated laboratory nursing environment for each of four conditions where interruption frequency was pre-determined. Four established human factors usability measures were completed for each of the four test conditions. The research questions were answered using repeated measures analysis of variance with (RM-ANOVA), McNamar's test, and Friedman's test. After each experiment, semi-structured interviews were used to collect data that were analyzed using inductive qualitative content analysis to determine RNs' perceptions of the impact of interruption frequency. Results: Results of the RM-ANOVA were significant for the main effect of interruption frequency on efficiency F(3,24)=9.592, p = .000. McNemar's test did not show significance for the impact of interruption frequency on effectiveness (accuracy). Friedman test showed participant satisfaction was significantly impacted by interruption frequency (x2=9.47, df=3, p=0.024). Friedman test showed no significance for the main effect of interruption frequency on cognitive workload scores by condition type (x2=1.88, df=3, p=0.599). Results of the qualitative content analysis revealed two main categories to describe nurses' perception of interruption frequency: the nature of interruptions and nurses' reaction to the interrupted work environment.Discussion/Implications: The results suggested that interruption frequency significantly affected task completion time and satisfaction for participants but not participant accuracy or cognitive workload. A high error rate during PCA programming tasks indicated the need to evaluate the conditions in which RNs complete PCA programming as each error presents potential risk of patient harm. RNs' described the impact of interruption frequency as having a negative impact on the work environment and subsequently implement compensating strategies to counterbalance interruptions. RNs' perceived that patient safety was negatively impacted by frequent interruption. RNs experienced negative intrapersonal consequences as a results of frequent interruption. Additional study is needed to better understand the impact of interruption frequency on RNs' performance accuracy and cognitive workload.
Identifier: CFE0005770 (IID), ucf:50099 (fedora)
Note(s): 2015-08-01
Ph.D.
Nursing, Nursing
Doctoral
This record was generated from author submitted information.
Subject(s): Medical-surgical nursing -- interruption -- medication error -- patient safety -- human factors
Persistent Link to This Record: http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0005770
Restrictions on Access: campus 2016-08-15
Host Institution: UCF

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