I attend rounds daily in the PICU (work in an academic children's hospital). Team consists of resident MDs, fellows (ED and PICU), pharmacist, dietician, and attending physicians. Advantages are: immediate response to queries (we do verbal queries during rounds), ability to educate on the spot, immediate collaboration with RD regarding any malnutrition opportunities, visibility and reminder to the team of the importance of documentation, and being able to query specialists when they round with their teams in PICU. Disadvantages are: decreased ability to review new admits in other units efficiently, questions from team members about issues not related to documentation (ie case management and billing questions). I find that the benefits far outweigh the disadvantages so make rounding a priority. My colleagues round with their teams in oncology and NICU.
Our CDI's used to attend daily rounds on all med-surg units with all of the other disciplines. The hospitalist's requested to only have rounds with the case managers as rounds were taking too long.
When we had a paper query system, it was useful to be at the table as we could get queries answered immediately. Since our queries are now electronic not being at rounds has not had an impact.
I attend ICU rounds twice a week, it's good to hear what is going on with the patient and what the plan is, but it really is not an appropriate time for education or to address queries.
Our CDI attend daily rounds on the med/surg units and I attend ICU twice a week. We use this as a way to focus on GMLOS and Transfer DRGs. It also is an opportunity to provide education to the entire team about the impact of documentation. CDI works collaboratively with Case Management on LOS.
For those who are attending rounds are you unit based or do you work in a office where you would not see physicians daily.
Our hospital has 3 CDSs and our assignments are unit based. We are housed in the HIM office and attend rounds with laptops. Unfortunately, our med/surg population is team-based and spread out among all the med/surg units, so it is difficult for us to attend med/surg rounds. We will typically attend service-line rounds (ICUs, heme/onc) on the unit in the AM and spend the afternoon in the office reviewing/following up on med/surg accounts and reconciliations. We rarely see MDs in the HIM office.
Comments
Jackie Touch
Our CDI's used to attend daily rounds on all med-surg units with all of the other disciplines. The hospitalist's requested to only have rounds with the case managers as rounds were taking too long.
When we had a paper query system, it was useful to be at the table as we could get queries answered immediately. Since our queries are now electronic not being at rounds has not had an impact.
I attend ICU rounds twice a week, it's good to hear what is going on with the patient and what the plan is, but it really is not an appropriate time for education or to address queries.
Jackie Touch
CHOC Children's
Orange, CA