Alarm Fatigue Analysis

568 Words2 Pages

Alarm fatigue is a growing problem that causes nurses to feel overwhelmed and not perform to the best of their abilities. Many people don’t understand the concept of alarm fatigue until they are in a hospital and hear the different noises going on first hand. Alarm fatigue occurs when nurses or other health care members have sensory overload due to the alarms, which then lead to ignoring the alarms raising concerns with patient safety (Horkan, 2014).
While nurses are working on a floor there are many different machines that have alarms such as IV pumps, ventilator machines, ECG’s, vital machines, call lights, and pagers. New nurses have shown a lack of response efforts to combat these alarms from a proposed desensitization and sensory overload of the alarm noise (Cvach, 2012). This is a patient safety concern due to what the alarms purpose is which in turn leads to varying amounts of potentially severe consqeunces if not answered promptly. Between 2009 and 2012 the joint commission stated that there were 80 patient deaths, 13 permanent losses of function, and 5 events that led to extended hospital stays (Horkan, 2014). It is important for nurses to recognize alarm fatigue and find interventions to help keep patients from being injured. …show more content…

Nurses that can use medical equipment with alarm systems properly can reduce the number of times alarms are set off which will then allow nurses to be more attentive to true alarms (Horkan, 2014). For dialysis patients the venous and arterial pressure alarms can be minimized by observing access sites and tubing for kinking or clotting of the blood (Horkan 2014). Alarm fatigue can further be minimized by hourly rounding by the nurse and or assistive personal. This will promote a better patient care setting by being aware of changes in

Open Document