Background: Our objective was to increase patient and medication scanning compliance to > 90% for all respiratory care staff at UCSD (University of California, San Diego) Health’s Hillcrest Medical Center in alignment with National Patient Safety Goals and UCSD Safe Medication Practices Committee. Methods: We analyzed metrics provided by the pharmacy gathered from the medication management dispensing software and the electronic medical record (EMR) monthly. We then identified constraints and areas of impedance to scanning and worked to incorporate solutions. Finally, the team compared initial data collected in January 2019 to endpoint data collected in April 2023. Results: Multiple barriers to scanning were discovered with the primary contributing factors being (A) staff education and (B) availability of technology. In addressing these issues, we began with introducing scanning compliance data into our daily huddles with staff, incorporated emphasis on scanning compliance as a patient safety tool into our new employee orientation program, provided monthly compliance feedback to staff paying specific attention to those under the 90% requirement and finally late in the process we replaced our staff cell phones with smart phones equipped with EMR scanning capabilities. Scanning compliance rose steadily from a baseline of only 80.8% of users achieving greater than the 90% compliance with a total patient/medication scanning compliance of 90.93% and 91.19% respectively in January 2019 to April 2023 with 95% of users achieving a greater than 90% compliance with a total patient/medication scanning compliance of 97.9% and 97.6% respectively. Conclusions: Our findings indicated that staff education and training, adherence to policy and procedures, and increased staff knowledge of scanning requirements contributed to these results. We will continue to monitor scanning compliance as it relates to patient safety and evaluate the effectiveness of the newly introduced technology.Figure 1. Patient Scanning Compliance, Hillcrest Respiratory Care Inpatient.Figure 2. Medication Scanning Compliance, Hillcrest Respiratory Care Inpatient
Dority et al. (Sun,) studied this question.