Less pain for patients makes great story

16 Jun 2016

Director of Emergency Medicine Paul Bailey said pain is the major reason for patients coming to the ED and so pain management (analgesia) is a key issue for emergency departments both in Australia and globally.

Global health organisation surveyors Press Ganey have selected St John of God Murdoch Hospital’s Emergency Department as a finalist in its 2016 Success Story Awards for improvements in managing patient’s pain.

“However, emergency doctors might be more conservative in their approach with pain management, partly given the nature of emergency departments, but also due to the many negative side effects of strong pain killers,” Dr Bailey said.

Despite being voted by patients as the top private emergency department in Australia for three consecutive years, Murdoch Private Emergency’s patients’ satisfaction with how their pain was managed was low, so the staff decided to make some changes under the banner of “Your pain – Our priority”.

The challenge was to alter the ED culture around pain management and involve as many treating staff as possible in the improvement of current practices.

“Early assessment of pain and provision of timely and appropriate analgesia is fundamental in the delivery of quality patient care,” Dr Bailey said.

A pain management team of medical and nursing representatives was established to develop a strategy for improving pain management. From these discussions, a nurse directed analgesia protocol was developed, where under the supervision of medical officers, nurses are able to administer analgesics to appropriate patients and assess patients pain using a verbal numeric rating scale from 0 -10.

Clinical Nurse Brontie Hicks said the protocols were launched with staff education and engagement, and evaluated three and 12 months after implementation.

“We found patients responded well to the pain scale and nurses were happy to be involved in decision making, which in turn improved patient outcomes and satisfaction,” Ms Hicks said.

Ms Hicks will travel to Sydney in August to represent the department and share how the department achieved such a great outcome.

“Hopefully listening to how we dealt with changing pain management practices will provide others with a clear vision of how to achieve their goals and implement a successful pain protocol.”

For more information about St John of God Murdoch Hospital’s Emergency Department, please visit St John of God Murdoch Hospital.