Yes! Nurses everywhere tell us how hard it is to get everything done -- there's never enough time! -- and even just to remember it all. When we forget or don't have enough time our patients' safety is impacted. At last, here is help with task tracking and time management.
It is a to-do list that knows what your tasks are and when they must be done. It helps you plan your time and remember to do everything.
It builds your task list from four sources:
- What type of unit you're working at, e.g. med-surg
- Which shift, e.g. evening
- Interventions your patients need, e.g. diabetes care
- Reminders you request, e.g. page the MD if she doesn't call me back
No! You select these four things from menus which requires just a few taps on your iPhone or iPod Touch -- preferably while you're taking report from the outgoing nurse -- and then you're ready to start working your shift. Things are constantly changing and with a few taps you can add interventions and reminders on the fly, at any time during your shift.
Subscribe (see below) to NGID's online service. Login to the web site and create a fine-tuned "shift definition" (to-do list for your hospital unit). It's easy and it takes just a few minutes. Then you can share it with the other nurses on your unit. They will appreciate it!
It has all the protections required of any medical data. That is, nothing is collected or released that would identify you or any patient.
HIPAA regulates the collection and use of Protected Health Information (PHI). This is any data that could identify a patient such as name, phone number, medical record number, etc. The NGID app collects no PHI. For example, patients are identified only by their initials or by a nickname.
The app costs $24.99. Buy it at Apple's iTunes store.A subscription costs $1.99/month. Subscribe on the NursesGetItDone.com web site here.
You don't -- it's optional. The app works fine without a subscription, in standalone mode. However, with a subscription, the social networking features (sharing to-do lists fine-tuned for your hospital unit) become available. Also, when you subscribe, your shift histories are recorded, enabling you to produce work diaries.
A work diary is a list of the shifts you've worked, including durations, locations, patient counts, and task counts. For example, you can see how many times you've given meds, done wound care, inserted NG tubes, etc. This is useful in documenting your work experience, confirming the accuracy of timeclock reports and paycheck stubs, and producing statistics about the patient populations you've served, e.g. what percentage is diabetic. We are fascinated by our nursing careers and presume you are, too. This gives us real numbers to describe them.
At present, NGID runs only on Apple's iPhone and iPod Touch. Our research tells us that this is the most popular smartphone among nurses today. If/when others such as those with Android become popular among nurses, we'll support them, too.