Exploring Nurses' Planning and Execution of Prospective Memory Activities

Abstract

Title: Exploring Nurses' Planning and Execution of Prospective Memory Activities Background: During the planning and execution of nursing activities in a hospital, intended activities are sometimes delayed and omitted, which affects patient safety and patient and nurses' satisfaction. Delays and omissions can occur due to prospective memory (PM) failures, which means not remembering to perform a planned intention, or due to conscious decisions, like having other priorities. To gain insight, current study captured nurses' intentions to perform activities during a shift and investigated execution and priority. Aim: To gain insight into the nurses' planning and execution of PM activities, in a hospital ward. Method: Descriptive study on twelve registered nurses, using observations per nurse to quantitatively measure the nurses' planning and execution of PM activities, followed by qualitative listing of captured intentions and a subsequent questionnaire to quantitatively measure the nurses' perspective of execution (in time, delayed, omitted) and prioritizing (Visual Analogue Scale 1-10). Results: Out of the 978 measured intentions to perform PM activities, 25.4% were delayed or omitted and 30.2% of these delays and omissions occurred due to PM failures. Nurses attached a significantly lower priority to the PM activities that were omitted due to PM failures, compared to the PM activities that were executed in time (p<0.05). One of the most common reasons for conscious delays and omissions was 'no priority'. Conclusion: PM failures played an important part in the measured delays and omissions. Prioritizing of PM activities turned out to be an essential factor in both omissions due to PM failures and conscious delays and omissions. Recommendations: Further research, focused on other hospitals and wards, age differences, personal differences in need for cues, optimal ways to plan and execute activities, and strategies to improve retrieval of intentions with a lower perceived priority.