Data-what does it mean? Sharing unit level data improves quality outcomes and the practice environment

Purpose:
Describe how the use of nursing shared governance councils promotes unit level accountability for outcomes related to nurse sensitive indicators and improvements in the professional practice environment.

Significance:
Healthcare has become increasingly more complex resulting in exponential amounts of data that is available to bed side clinicians. Shared governance councils provide a platform to disseminate data, provide education about the meaning of data and identify sustainable improvement strategies.

Strategy and Implementation:
The nursing department has used shared governance as an organizational model of participative decision making for the past decade. The model has evolved to include both unit level planning committees and department level councils that address issues pertinent to improving patient outcomes and enhancing the practice environment. The shared governance model has become the primary vehicle that is used to engage staff, ensuring nurses have a voice in decisions affecting their patients. The shared governance councils promote nurses' contribution to patient outcomes, decision-making and delivery of quality care. Quality outcomes and RN satisfaction data are shared at council meetings. Members share performance data with individual unit leadership and staff in order to develop action plans addressing improvement opportunities. To hardwire improvement strategies, unit representatives report on the progress of their improvement strategies with their peers at monthly council meetings.

Evaluation:
For two recent reporting periods, on the PES portion of the NDNQI RN survey, the organization outperformed the mean of the all hospital comparative group in overall score as well as Nurse Participation in Hospital Affairs and Nursing Foundations for Quality of Care components.

Implications for Practice:
Shared governance is an effective participative model that engages staff nurses in patient outcomes. Incorporating departmental and unit quality and RN satisfaction metrics into the work of the council enhances individual practitioner accountability and ownership of outcomes.