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Family Role in Patient Safety in the Intensive Care Unit

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Families in the Intensive Care Unit

Abstract

Family members feel a natural inclination to protect and serve their loved ones and can serve an important role in patient safety in the intensive care unit (ICU). However, family members have often been excluded from this role by policies that keep them away from the bedside and have not been included in safety process design. In order to include families in a way that can maximize patient safety, healthcare providers must encourage the following: (1) family members must be included as part of the team during rounds, procedures, and bedside care; (2) family members need to be empowered to speak up if something is not going well with their loved one or if they are concerned about a potential error; and (3) family members need to be given a role to play in development of hospital safety policy and plans that would encourage these actions, such as through Patient-Family Advisory Councils (PFACs).

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Acknowledgments

We appreciate the insights and advice on this chapter from the following: Intermountain Medical Center, Patient-Family Advisory Council members, nursing staff of the Shock Trauma Intensive Care Unit at Intermountain Medical Center, and the Center for Humanizing Critical Care led by Samuel Brown, MD, and Elliotte Hirshberg, MD.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care, Department of Medicine, University of Utah School of Medicine, Salt Lake City, UT, USA

    A. Doran Bostwick & Sarah J. Beesley

  2. Pulmonary Division, Department of Medicine, Intermountain Medical Center, Shock Trauma Intensive Care Unit, Murray, UT, USA

    Sarah J. Beesley

Authors
  1. A. Doran Bostwick
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  2. Sarah J. Beesley
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Correspondence to Sarah J. Beesley .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine, University of Maryland School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, USA

    Giora Netzer

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Doran Bostwick, A., Beesley, S.J. (2018). Family Role in Patient Safety in the Intensive Care Unit. In: Netzer, G. (eds) Families in the Intensive Care Unit. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-94337-4_20

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-94337-4_20

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