Building Trust by Prioritizing Patient Care
Greiner Bio-One Preanalytics is a best practice champion in patient care, prioritizing patient safety as well as healthcare worker satisfaction in the area of Preanalytics.
The first steps towards major innovation in safety were taken in the eighties. Venous blood collection was revolutionized with Greiner Bio-One’s launch of the first evacuated blood collection tube made from plastic. This was just the first of many innovations to come in the world of sample collection.
How does this support patient care? Greiner Bio-One enables a range of product solutions for varying settings.
The benefits of making good product choices
When a healthcare provider makes good product choices and prioritizes staff training, the healthcare worker has the tools for building patient trust by demonstrating compassion and competence.
| Action | Benefit |
|---|---|
|
Communication Communication goes both ways; listening is just as important as talking but the non-verbal signs also tell a story. |
Asking and hearing about a patient’s past experience, or what he/she finds most comfortable is a good basis. The patient should also understand what is coming up, and explanation of the procedure and what to expect is critical, especially as consent from the patient, even in non-verbal form, is essential. |
|
Stress-free atmosphere If all sample collection equipment has been properly prepared, taking care of the details including where, for example, the sharps container is positioned, it avoids unnecessary movement and discomfort. |
The atmosphere should ensure that the patient feels as relaxed as possible, minimizing stress effects on the veins. |
|
Gentle procedure Before performing the venepuncture, there should be sufficient time left to let the disinfectant dry completely on the patient’s skin. Another source of pain could occur by selecting the wrong needle. To prevent this, the vein conditions must be examined thoroughly, using a vein visualization device if necessary and available. |
If not, the puncture could burn, as the solution seeps into the wound. Veins are delicate and a puncture wound is an injury – the wound should be kept as minimal as possible by choosing the smallest possible needle size for the vein. |
|
Correct application of tourniquet Only as much pressure as necessary should be applied, this is said to be around 40 mmHg. The tourniquet should not pinch the patient’s skin and should be snug but not tight. Once blood flows into the first tube, the tourniquet can be released. |
Too tight, and the tourniquet can cause discomfort. Not only this, but it can also falsify some parameters in the samples. |
|
Correct handling of samples Specimen collection tubes contain chemical additives to preserve the sample material optimally and to fully enable this, the tubes should be inverted fully 5-10 times (4-5 times in sodium citrate/coagulation/blue cap tubes). Great care should be taken to labelling samples, ensuring data is complete and that any manually applied data/barcode labels are in the correct position. |
Optimal sample material conditions are important for accurate diagnoses. If data is missing or if the label is in the wrong position, laboratory instrumentation may not be able to process the sample, rejecting it. This means a sample may need to be collected again, and a diagnosis is delayed, causing discomfort and inconvenience to the patient. |
|
After care Once the procedure is over, pressure should be applied to the puncture wound. Once bleeding has stopped, a plaster can be applied. |
Pressure application prevents the chances of a haematoma forming. |
