'Paper care not patient care': Nurse and patient experiences of comprehensive risk assessment and care plan documentation in hospital.
Catherine Paterson, Cara Roberts, Kasia Bail
PMID 35352417WHAT IT FOUND
Most patients praised nursing care, but care-plan paperwork was 'paper care, not patient care': risk prompts helped, while duplicated forms, poor team integration and daily signatures did not.
Key findings
01Patients praised nursing care, but many did not know or sign their daily care plan.
02Nurses said the care-plan document was mainly nursing work and was not used by other disciplines.
03All nurses regarded the required daily patient signature as unhelpful, and most patients would not have wanted to sign.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for RNs
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What it does not show
The study was done in one large hospital organisation, so the findings may not transfer to other settings. Patients were invited through nurses, and those who agreed may have been more positive about care, so patient accounts may overstate satisfaction. Only one allied health professional participated and no other multidisciplinary team members consented, so the paper does not capture doctor or allied health perspectives well. The study describes experiences of documentation and does not test whether changing forms improves patient outcomes.
Declared interests
The authors declared no conflicts of interest. The study was funded by ACT Health, Australia, and the University of Canberra. It was part of a health-service quality improvement and accreditation documentation pilot.
The easy way to misread this
Do not read the positive patient accounts as proof that the documentation improved care. The study reports experiences in one hospital and did not test patient outcomes.