Managing Postoperative Pain for Timely Discharge of Total Hip Replacement Patients

This project requires three competency area of Clinical Nurse Leader: 1) Essential 2:Organizational and Systems Leadership, good fiscal stewardship is a condition of quality care, 2) Essential 3: Quality Improvement and Safety, practice guidelines are based on evidence, and 3) Essential 4: Translating and Integrating Scholarship into practice, client-centered practice is intra- and interdisciplinary. The purpose of this study is to develop a nursing intervention that would result in enhanced comfort for total hip replacement patients so timely hospital discharge (i.e., within 2 days) can be achieved. The preceptor site for this project is a hospital located in northern California. This institution is certified excellent in bariatric and orthopedic surgery. The Bariatric-Orthopedic Medical Surgical Unit has 30-patient bed capacity. My project’s goal is to utilize pain management rounds to help decrease hospital length of stay. Also, the study is specific to post operative THR patient and hourly rounds that will compliment patient assessment. The global aim of this project is quality patient care and cost-effective health care management. Inadequate pain relief can contribute to post-op complications such as delayed wound healing, atelectasis, and deep vein thrombosis. Nurses who care for postoperative surgical patients must recognize the need for adequate pain management and look at the latest data and evidence based practice