The Patient/Family Relations Department is aiming to increase staff awareness and accountability for managing patient belongings.
Following a whole year of research and exploring ways to promote employee accountability for patients’ belongings, the ASCEND team developed the Tag It, Green Bag It project. This new strategy, ultimately carried out by the Department of Patient/ Family Relations, is a way to decrease lost belongings, increase patient satisfaction and bring awareness to the issue.
“Lost belongings dramatically affect patient satisfaction and the ability of patients and their families to feel confident and comfortable with our ability to deliver the quality care that we promote,” said Gretchen Flack, Patient/ Family representative, Department of Patient/Family Relations.
The Tag It, Green Bag It project consists of providing patients with green patient belonging bags as well as smaller green slide-loc ‘pouches’ for glasses, dentures, hearing aids, and other smaller items. In addition, Patient/Family Relations staff are working to re-educate staff on the crucial importance of ‘tagging’ all patient belongings bags with an addressograph label, or at the very least, the patient’s first and last name and medical record number.
The color green was picked to make belongings bags more visible on beds and underneath stretchers.
“The Patient/Family Relations Department is aiming to increase staff awareness and accountability for managing patient belongings as well as increasing visibility of patient belongings hospital-wide,” added Flack.
“Implementing this new system should make it easier for nurses to locate these items, and also increase everyone’s awareness of the importance of keeping patient belongings with the patient, both while in the room and also during patient transfers between rooms,” said Robin Rossignol, RN, assistant nurse manager, Tower 7ABCD.
The new green bags are being implemented during February. In the next few weeks, representatives from Patient/Family Relations will be visiting units and speaking with staff to answer questions about the bags, and the process for managing patient belongings.
For more information, email Flack (gflack@partners.org).