In a time of limited budgets, some facilities, such as Inova Alexandria (VA) Hospital, are still willing to spend about $2,500 per bed to be able to locate their nurses at a moment’s notice.
According to Medill Reports, a Northwestern University publication, nurse tracking systems are a booming market.
The systems work by having each nurse wear a badge that relays his or her location to the front desk. An intercom system is placed throughout the facility, and when a specific nurse is needed, the front desk locates his or her position and uses the closest intercom to communicate the patient’s needs. The system is said to save traveling time searching for nurses, and to be less disruptive to patients by eliminating generic pages over all the loudspeakers on the floor.
The system also reports how much time passes between a patient’s call and the time it’s answered. Proponents of the system say this will help better staff units and increase quality patient care. Opponents say administration may use this as a way to discipline nurses who have long response times, which will make the nursing profession even more stressful.
Click here to see a video of the nurse tracking system in action.
Are nurse tracking systems a good or bad thing? Leave a comment and let us know.
December 5th, 2008 at 11:01 am
Hi Julie–
My name is Taryn and just recently moved to Mass. For the past year, I have been a nurse at–you guessed it, Inova ALexandria Hospital in Va. Yup, I got to wear the GPS device everrryy day at work–we called them “eggs” because that was their shape. They were the most annoying things to wear and served little purpose. The devices were heavy and we had to wear them above our waist or they supposedly didn’t work–which made for some interesting pinning techniques to keep us from showing a little too much to our patients!
For the most part, we did not ever use the GPS at all. Our boss would constantly tell us we needed them to prove to patients and family members that we were there for them and did respond to their calls. Many times patients would tell health care staff or their families that we were not responding to their calls at night and the GPS was supposed to be the answer, although it was never really brought up to family members or used as a teaching tool for the nurses to improve their response times. It was simply there, and would allow other staff members working the same shift to know where you are at all times. Bathroom, locker, patient room, clean utility room… Why does someone need to know where we are at ALL times? If we are responsible nurses we will not be traveling far from our patients, and will be easily accessible on the unit. I felt it to be a huge invasion of privacy and did not like the idea of it at all.
Although I can see why knowing where to find a patient’s nurse is valuable, I do not feel a “tracking device” is the answer. Nurses often do not get the respect they deserve and I feel that tracking them like an animal does not help this issue.