Improving Nursing Quality of Patient Care

Building An Effective Team to Support and Improve Patient Care

When forming a quality improvement team, the strategy to implement is to include the right people on the team (Al-Mansour et al., 2020). Before determining who the right people are, we should first determine the team's aim. For our case, the objective is to support and improve patient care. Therefore, our team should comprise nurses and nursing leadership with experience in patient care. The second aspect will be considering the system that relates to our aim of supporting and improving patient care. Lastly, we should ensure the team comprises members familiar with all aspects of patient care. The most critical part of a team is the members. The ideal team members should ideally be interacting directly with the patients, willing to learn from the other team members, ready to maintain open communication, willing to assume individual responsibility that contributes to the team's success, and committed to the team's success in improving patient care. The team should have members with complementary skills.

The stakeholders to be included in the quality improvement team would be those with expertise in system leadership, technical expertise, and day-to-day leadership (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Health Resources and Services Administration, n.d). The team should have representatives in all three areas to drive improvement successfully. System leadership understands the implications of the proposed change and its impact on the organization. A team should have a leader with the authority to institute suggested changes and can overcome barriers that inhibit change implementation. The leader should have the power to push for the change in the organization. With such a leader, the team can be confident that they will make headway and that the proposed changes can be implemented. Teams fail when there are barriers to the implementation of suggested changes. The role of system leadership is to allocate resources and time to the team members and implement the proposed changes in the organization. System leaders could be MDs, Medical Director, and Director of Nursing.

Technical expertise comprises people with knowledge of the subject and an understanding of care processes. Technical experts will assist the team in determining what to measure, provide guidance on collecting, interpreting, and displaying data, and help design practical measurement tools (Institute for Healthcare Improvement, n.d). Technical experts interact daily with the patients and have intimate information on areas where improvement is needed. Technical experts could be directors, Nurse Managers, and Quality Improvement specialists.

Day-to-day leaders are the drivers of the project. They oversee data collection and ensure tests are implemented (Institute for Healthcare Improvement, n.d). These individuals understand the details of patient care and areas where improvements are needed. They also appreciate the proposed improvements' impact on nursing and patients. These individuals will provide better insights into what needs changing and how to go about the change. Since they directly deal with patients, they understand what can be modified to improve patient care and how the organization can support them. Day-to-day leaders include RN, surgical nurses, medical nurses, and nurse managers.

The biggest challenge when it comes to determining who earns a seat on the team is establishing the personal attributes of a person. The individuals being considered for the team might have good reviews in work matters, but they might be toxic to the team. The best people to include in the team are those who have demonstrated they can be team players and listen to others. For example, a nurse can be an excellent performer in their duties. However, they might struggle when it comes to passing information to others or listening to the opinions of others. Such a person might not be favorable to include in the team. The challenge is determining these attributes before being selected to join the team.