Nurse specialist treatment of eye emergencies: five year follow up study of quality and effectiveness.
The role of specialist nurses in triage, diagnosis and management of emergency eye conditions is well established, and encouraging reports of the safety and effectiveness of such services have been published. Specialist nurses in an emergency eye clinic in the UK seeing >7000 patients per year had been found at initial evaluation to treat 22% of the 1976 patients seen over a three month period without referring on to an ophthalmologist. A repeat of this evaluation five years later found this proportion had dropped to 17% (chi(2) = 16.7, p<0.01). In addition, the initial evaluation had found no incident of any patient having been treated and discharged by the specialist nurses returning to the department due to incorrect diagnosis or mismanagement. By contrast, from the sample 5 years later, 3 patients were identified who returned to the department due to possible misdiagnosis or sub-optimal management. We suggest that provision must be made for continuing professional development of nurses in this type of extended role, and the commitment to ongoing education should be backed up by a system of monitoring and critical incident reporting to facilitate skill maintenance and the life long learning process for specialist nurses.
Buchan
John Cameron
JC
Department of Ophthalmology, St. James's University Hospital, Beckett Street, Leeds LS9 7TF, United Kingdom. johnbuchan@gmail.com
Ashiq
Aruna
A
Kitson
Neil
N
Dixon
Julie
J
Cassels-Brown
Andy
A
Bradbury
John A
JA
D000328:Adult; D002983:Clinical Competence; D004509:Education, Nursing, Continuing; D004630:Emergencies / Q000451:nursing; D016529:Emergency Nursing / Q000193:education / Q000458:organization & administration*; D004636:Emergency Service, Hospital / Q000458:organization & administration; D004739:England / Q000453:epidemiology; D005128:Eye Diseases / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000451:nursing*; D005260:Female; D006301:Health Services Needs and Demand; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009720:Nurse Clinicians / Q000193:education / Q000458:organization & administration*; D024802:Nurse's Role; D009730:Nursing Assessment; D015403:Nursing Evaluation Research; D015397:Program Evaluation; D011787:Quality of Health Care / Q000458:organization & administration*; D012017:Referral and Consultation / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D014218:Triage / Q000458:organization & administration