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Note: Your Staff Manager configuration may not include this optional application. To add this application to your configuration, contact your Clinical Consultant or Client Advocate.
Outcomes-Driven Acuity automates the outcomes-driven methodology for patient acuity. Outcomes-Driven Acuity focuses on each patient’s progress (or lack of progress) toward expected outcomes. It also calculates the staffing needed by skill to optimize the patient’s progress through the health care facility.
Staff Manager Outcomes-Driven Acuity is usually based on Nursing Outcomes Classification (NOC), developed by the University of Iowa School of Nursing and licensed by Elsevier, Inc. The application does support alternate outcomes-based taxonomies upon request; however, for the purpose of this documentation, NOC is referenced.
NOC outcomes © 2013 Elsevier, Inc.
Outcomes-Driven Acuity uses a five-point Likert-type scale to measure all NOC outcomes. The rating on the far left is the least desirable rating for the outcome, and the rating on the far right is the most desirable rating. You should keep in mind, however, that not all patients are able to achieve the most desirable rating. For example, a patient with end-stage kidney disease cannot achieve a rating of Not Compromised for the Kidney Function outcome without a kidney transplant.
Outcomes-Driven Acuity uses NOC outcomes to
The Patient Acuity Assessment page displays each outcome with its definition. You select an outcome rating based on your clinical judgment about the patient’s status for the outcome.
For example, the outcome Comfort Level includes the following indicators.
One indicator can be associated with many outcomes.
Outcomes-Driven Acuity uses Likert scales to assign numerical values to NOC outcomes. The application then uses these numbers to calculate a patient's acuity level. Each outcome has a scale of 1 to 5, with 1 being the least desirable rating and 5 the most desirable rating.
When users complete a patient assessment, they are comparing the patient to a non-hospitalized individual of similar age and same gender. As the nurse conducts the assessment, he or she will consider the indicators for the outcome and identify which, if any deviate from normal. In selecting the appropriate rating, the nurse will consider:
Schedulers use Staff Manager Client to set employee security permissions. You can either A) read Acuity data only or B) read and edit Acuity data. These permissions control access to the acuity data for all profiles and locations. The Acuity menu provides access to four key areas.
| Employee Permission | Patient Assessment Page | Assessment Status Page | Patient Assessment History Page | Patient Assessment Audit Page |
| Read Access to Acuity Data | Cannot open | Cannot open | Can view but cannot delete an assessment; can view and print assessments in History and in Audit Printable View | Cannot open |
| Read and Write Access to Acuity Data | Can open | Cannot open | Can view and delete an assessment; can view and print assessments in History and in Audit Printable View | Can open |
You select profiles, locations, and patients with the Navigation Pane on the left side of the Acuity pages.
The first time you open an Acuity page, there are no selected profiles or locations or patients in the Navigation Pane. Instead, you see the following message in the page's content area: Please select a profile from the navigation pane.
The Navigation Pane saves your selections by your user login. The next time you open an Acuity page, the pane will have your previously selected profiles and locations already highlighted. Since the patient list is dynamic, however, you must still select a patient to use the page.
The Selection Criteria section of the Navigation Pane contains the Profile/Location selection tree. You select a profile or location by clicking the check box in front of its name.
The profile name is often the same as the location name. If a particular profile includes several Registration locations, users can see those locations by clicking the plus sign (+) beside the profile name. Once you select a profile, a message is displayed in the upper right corner of the content pane: Reading the patient information. Please wait.
Once the application has read the patient data for the selected profiles, it lists the patients under the Patient List section of the Navigation Pane. Click a patient name to select it. The acuity assessment page loads automatically as soon as you select a patient.
The default Filter setting for patients is Show Current. This filter displays all patients on the selected profiles and locations as of now, according to the patient location list maintained by the Registration Import.
You can also select the Show Recent filter. This filter displays only those patients who were in one of the selected locations within the past eight hours, but who are currently in a different profile/location.