In this assignment, you will identify the knowledge, skills, and attitudes for each of the QSEN graduate competencies that relate to the practice/clinical issue that you identified in Week 14 Discussion 1: Practical/Clinical Issue. Please use the QSEN Competency Table (Word) to identify aspects of each competency and how you incorporated or addressed the knowledge, skills, and attitudes. For this assignment, please have a minimum of three references.

To receive full points on this assignment, you must complete the QSEN Competency Table related to the issue you identified by yourself and make sure that there are at least three references to support your work. 

My Identified problem week 14:

The Quality and Safety Education for Nurses (QSEN) project is designed and driven toward meeting the primary goal of readying future nursing professionals for their roles by providing knowledge, skills, and propensities needed to sustain their continued enhancement in providing quality and safe care (QSEN, 2020). After reviewing the QSEN Graduate document, particularly focusing on the competencies of Safety and Teamwork/Collaboration, I have identified potential issues that limit the delivery of safe and quality care within my clinical practice setting.

            At my place of work, there have been rising cases of mostly preventable post-surgical complications ever since a significant number of nurses quit during the COVID-19 pandemic and new ones replaced them. These complications are a significant issue since they place patients at risk and keep them dissatisfied with the care provided, increasing recovery time. The new work dynamics with added pressure from COVID-19 patient surges on the limited number of nursing staff has caused a disconnect in teamwork and collaborative efforts, linked to many of the issues Cohen et al. (2020) link to the rising number of post-surgical complications. The author adds that a lack of teamwork and collaboration causes inefficiencies such as delays in diagnosis and delayed or failed treatment that diminishes the quality and safety of care provided (Cohen et al., 2020).

            If left unresolved, the identified issue of surging post-surgical complications will likely lead to higher mortality rates among surgical patients, which could attract lawsuits that would bankrupt the hospital. Also, without appropriate and timely surgery, care providers are negligent, which impacts healthcare delivery in general since professionals are supposed to be trusted to place patients’ best interests at the forefront (Donaldson et al., 2020). The hospital should conduct an inquiry and develop resolutions, among them updated patient safety processes and guidelines with accompanying staff reconfiguration to ensure improved efficiency in operations. Notably, regardless of changes within the health care system and the updated regulatory directives, the primary concern remains to be excellent patient safety and care.

References

Cohen, T. N., Ley, E. J., & Gewertz, B. L. (2020). Human factors in surgery: Enhancing safety and flow in patient care. Springer Nature.

Donaldson, L., Ricciardi, W., Sheridan, S., & Tartaglia, R. (2020). Textbook of patient safety and clinical risk management. Springer Nature.

QSEN. (2020). Graduate QSEN competencies. qsen.org. Retrieved August 3, 2022, from https://qsen.org/competencies/graduate-ksas/#patient-centered_care