Sign Outs/Hand Offs

[futuremd22283]

So with all the new guidelines of reduced hours for interns (and slightly reduced for upper levels), we're definitely going to be increasing the sign outs and the emphasis that will need to be placed on them. I, for one, think that there is a large potential to at least make as many errors due to increased sign outs as errors that will be prevented by shorter hours. I think the only way we will be able to avoid a significant amount of errors is to become more efficient and more effective at sign outs.

Does anyone have a good template or model that they use for creating a list for sign out? I'm pushing to get a standardized model for our program to follow so that we can take some of the variability out of the equation. I would appreciate any help or opinions on this. Thanks.

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[jdh71]

So with all the new guidelines of reduced hours for interns (and slightly reduced for upper levels), we're definitely going to be increasing the sign outs and the emphasis that will need to be placed on them. I, for one, think that there is a large potential to at least make as many errors due to increased sign outs as errors that will be prevented by shorter hours. I think the only way we will be able to avoid a significant amount of errors is to become more efficient and more effective at sign outs.

Does anyone have a good template or model that they use for creating a list for sign out? I'm pushing to get a standardized model for our program to follow so that we can take some of the variability out of the equation. I would appreciate any help or opinions on this. Thanks.

Somehow I managed to get "nominated" (Ugh) to a committee looking at this issue. And ACGME is not ONLY interested in reduced work hours but ALSO in fewer number of hand-offs. I would not count on interns doing more hand-offs, rather, it will be upper levels taking more "intern-like" call and holding the cross-cover list so that check-out can be done once in the evening by the primary team to the on call upper level and the patients get checked back to the primary team in the morning by the SAME resident.

We use a standard template for our check out lists. PM me if you'd like to see an example. It's nothing earth shattering or ground breaking, but it's the same format for every patient.