Ideas That Work: All Hands on Deck

Staff who need to call a code blue during an emergent situation sometimes hesitate to ask for help. In our hospital, nurses are educated and encouraged to call a code as soon as the need arises. An educational program we ran called "No Call is a Bad Call" emphasized the need for nurses and ancillary staff to ask for backup without hesitation. Each session began with a discussion about proper response protocols to a code blue before the team ran through a mock code, followed by a debrief to discuss how it went and areas of needed improvement. During the experience, nurses practiced serving in different roles, including team leader, recorder, vascular access/medication RN and code cart RN. The experience gave nurses the opportunity to interact with colleagues from different units who they could end up working alongside during a real code situation. From an educator's standpoint, the session has given me vital information and data to create focused monthly educational topics as we continually enhance our code blue protocols.

Rosalynn Gurrola, BSN, RN, CPAN
PIH Health Hospital
Downey, Calif.
[email protected]