Poster Abstracts

PO2022-001
Development of the Johns Hopkins – Safe Patient Handling Mobility Guide to Inform Use of Safe Patient Handling Equipment to Meet a Daily Mobility Goal for Hospitalized Patients
By Sowmya Kumble, PT, NCS, Michael Friedman, PT, MBA and Daniel L Young, PT, DPT, PhD

Traditionally, Safe Patient Handling Programs focus only on prevention of staff injuries. We propose a model of care that prevents staff injuries and at the same time promotes safe patient mobility. It is well documented in the literature that hospitalized patients spend the majority of time in bed. Patients at lower functional levels are at much higher risk for immobility related harms such as deconditioning and pressure injuries. Too often hospital staff use total assist lifts for patients who need a lot of mobility help even when the patients are capable of participating if appropriate safe patient handling equipment were used. On the other hand, patients at moderate or higher functioning may not be encouraged to participate in out of bed and ambulation activities due to staffs’ fear of patient falls. Nursing staff have indicated difficulty matching appropriate safe patient handling equipment based on patient’s capacity to facilitate patient mobility activities. All these factors exacerbate the existing epidemic of hospital immobility culture. This presentation will highlight the opportunity to utilize a nursing assessment of patient’s mobility capacity (the AM-PAC “6-Clicks” Basic Mobility Short Form) to guide safe patient handling equipment selection. We will introduce the Johns Hopkins-Safe Patient Handling Mobility Tool (JH-SPHM) to guide the clinician in choosing appropriate safe patient handling equipment to protect staff and at the same time promote safe patient mobility for hospitalized patients.

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PO2022-002
Proning Patients with COVID-19: An Injury Prevention Initiative
By Tracy Thermidor, PT, DPT

Background:
The safe patient handling & mobility (SPHM) department launched at NYU Brooklyn in June of 2018 to serve, educate, and provide guidance to NYULH staff on SPH technique and equipment. Since the departments launch a number of initiatives have been implemented to positively influence staff and patient safety.

In 2020, the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic led to the development of SPHM targeted education. An influx in new and temporary clinical staff along with the implementation of prone positioning initiatives presented some challenges. However, these challenges were swiftly addressed via various solutions related to adequate personnel, prone positioning education/training and interdisciplinary collaboration.

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