Improving sleep in the hospital leads to significant decrease in delirium:
A CNS-led project Abbott Northwestern Clinical Nurse Specialists, Liz Kozub and Autumn Gode, led an evidence based practice initiative to improve sleep and reduce the delirium in 2017. Delirium is sudden confusion that develops over a short period of time and it is known that up to 30% of patients in the hospital will have delirium. Some reasons a person may develop delirium include pain, lack of activity, certain medications, lack of sleep, and older age. The main purpose of this project was to prevent complications such as delirium and improve satisfaction of the hospital stay.
The sleep promotion initiative to reduce the frequency of delirium on two hospital units was created to allow for a period of uninterrupted sleep. The program consisted of reducing noise and interruptions during the overnight period. Patients are offered a sleep menu with a variety of options to increase their comfort at night. The project was carried out on a surgical spine and medical oncology unit. The results were astonishing, with significant decrease (40% reduction) in delirium. In addition, patients reported more satisfaction with their hospital stay.