The days of wondering when a nurse or doctor will see them are over for patients at King Edward VII Memorial Hospital.

Preston Swan, vice president of Quality and Risk Management at KEMH, said a new policy of hourly rounding is now in place on the four main wards during the day.

At night, nurses check on patients every two hours instead of every hour.

This means that at least once every hour during the day, a nurse checks in on each patient.

According to Mr. Swan, this has greatly improved patient satisfaction. Surveys are done monthly by Research.bm and Mr. Swan said his department looks over the data very carefully. The respondents are selected randomly.

"We do over 300 patient surveys a month," he said. Almost anyone coming for treatment at the hospital can be chosen – in-patients, out-patients, visitors to the Emergency Department and surgical patients. Quality of care is continuous.

"It's a journey and we are always looking at improvements, always aiming to achieve best practice," said Mr. Swan.

The new practice of seeing patients at least once every hour brings KEMH more in-line with best practices for health care institutions.

"The hourly rounding is a nursing and quality initiative," said Mr. Swan. "The emphasis is on addressing the three Ps: position, to prevent bed sores; potty, to offer assistance if necessary to the bathroom, to prevent falls and pain, to assess pain regularly and offer medication as necessary.

"All these measures will help to keep patients safe, reduce the frequency of using the call bells and increase patient satisfaction."

Patients at KEMH have indicated that they like the attention hourly rounding affords them. They feel that they are truly being cared for and have not been lost in the hustle and bustle of hospital activity.

While the hospital is always caring for patients, Mr. Swan admitted that that is not always the perception from the patient's point of view.

But he said since the introduction of the hospitalists programme, patient satisfaction has been rising.

Hospitalists are staff doctors that care for patients in the hospital. This may sound odd, but before the programme was implemented, it fell to a patient's personal doctor to attend to them despite the fact that they did not work for KEMH.

They were granted permission from the hospital, commonly referred to as "hospital privileges".

However the hospital was powerless to make demands on the doctors and could not require them to see their patients every day. The new system was introduced early this year. It allows hospital staff doctors, called hospitalists, to assume responsibility for patients.

"The hospitalists team do daily rounds on patients to discuss their care and treatment," said Mr. Swan.

Patients love the new programme, he said. Private doctors now liaise with hospitalists who talk regularly and directly with patients.

Mr. Swan said the hospitalists brief patients on talks they've had with their private doctors and present advice/options and let them know of decisions made.

This improvement in patient-physician communications also helps patients psychologically.

They are kept abreast of their health care and don't have to wonder and worry unnecessarily.

Hourly rounding began in KEMH's Gordon and Cooper wards in June and in October was expanded to Perry and Curtis wards.

Mr. Swan said in the next few months it will be extended to the hospital's Gosling and Maternity wards.