Project Details
About the Project
Over the past year, the newly developed cardiac arrest algorithm, the outcome of a process supported through a SIFEI grant and led by Dr. Mark German, has been steadily approaching implementation with patients undergoing cardiac surgery. Engagement with the broader cardiac surgery group and intensive care physicians has helped to further refine the algorithm with suggestions from physicians regularly participating in the Code Blue teams.
To continue this process of engaging and refining this guideline-directed and centre-specific algorithm, Dr. German sought support for an additional phase of funding. This was aimed at developing the local training program content necessary to ensure staff comfort and knowledge of the new algorithm.
Through a series of engagements with the Cardiac Care Unit, CVU, and 3 North Clinical Nurse Educators and Clinical Nurse Leaders, ICU Physicians, and Cardiac Surgeons, the team developed focused action plans for a training day to ensure widespread comfort with the algorithm among all staff. This initial training session was attended by physicians, a nurse practitioner, as well as multiple nurse educators. It was well received, and helped to identify the desired focus of attendees on simulation. One of the key outcomes of collaboration between all of the involved groups was a new type of code call for arrests occurring in patients after cardiac surgery. The unique condition of these patients necessitates that those attending the code to help are alerted to perform the different algorithm, which is known to result in improved outcomes. Future efforts will focus on ongoing quality control measures to assess the impact of this algorithm on patient outcomes and staff satisfaction.