What makes handover communication effective?

Abstract

H andover communication is a term that isn't new to the healthcare profession. It implies that there's a sharing or transfer of information and knowledge along with authority and responsibility among healthcare providers. 1 The provision of quality nursing care depends on the handover process.In 2010, The Joint Commission's Center for Transforming Healthcare indicated that an estimated 80% of serious, preventable adverse events are related to miscommunication between caregivers. 2 As a result, The Joint Commission requires healthcare organizations to implement a standardized approach to handover communication with the intent to strengthen the communication between healthcare providers during handover processes. 3 Although there are many articles that identify the negative consequences of inadequate nursing handovers, there's little research to identify best practices. Moreover, in a literature search using the term "handover communication for nursing," several articles focused on handover communication during the perianesthesia period, but no articles were found that focused on handover communication in behavioral health. This led us to compare our nurse satisfaction scores before and following an educational intervention regarding handover communication on a behavioral health unit located in a community medical center in the Midwest. Data collectionThe Clinical Handover Staff Survey, developed to foster information from nurses about their perceptions of the handover process, consisted of 20 statements on a 7-point Likert scale ranging from Strongly Disagree (1) to Strongly Agree (7). (See Table 1.) Each item was given a score from 1 to 7, with negatively worded items reverse scored so that higher scores indicated positive perceptions and lower scores indicated negative perceptions of handover. To capture qualitative data from the nurses, they were queried to identify the perceived strengths and limitations of the current handover communication process and how they thought it could be improved.Staff nurses were given the survey to voluntarily complete and put in a wrapped box located in a locked room on the unit. Only staff members had a key to the locked room. The clinical nurse researcher collected the surveys from the wrapped box; only she had access to the raw data.Handover communication education Preparation. A core team, consisting of a master'sprepared counselor, a PhD-prepared clinical nurse educator, a master's-prepared nurse manager, three charge nurses, a master's-prepared nurse director, a secretary with an MBA, and the PhDprepared clinical nurse researcher, convened for the purpose of sharing the vision for shift report change, directing the change effort, and providing clarity for the end goal. In addition, the core team provided the education intervention, answered questions, role modeled the desired behaviors for other staff on the units, posted flyers, modified the written situation-background-assessmentrecommendation (SBAR) communication form with input from nursing staff to be used in the inter...

Handovers in care homes for older people – their type, timing and usefulness. Findings from a scoping review

“…Handovers are often presented as being resource-intensive because of the need for staff to prepare information for the oncoming shift and, in the case of verbal or bedside handovers, for overlap between the outgoing and incoming shifts (Petersen et al 2013; Tucker and Fox 2014). Funding pressures appear to have had an impact on handover procedures (Burns, Hyde and Killett 2016; Killett et al .…”

Evaluation of a clinical handover simulation training session for junior doctors in psychiatry

“…SBAR provides a focused way to communicate patients’ conditions between professionals and set out clear expectations to senior team members. SBAR has been used in a variety of handover activities, including between healthcare professionals in a paediatrics/perinatal department,17 between nurses at a community behavioural health centre18 and in emergency situations. We found no evidence about the use of SBAR for doctors in mental healthcare settings.…”