NCT06175091

Impact of an Alarm Management Protocol on Noise Pollution and Patient Safety in Intensive Care Units

• Status: Recruiting
• Phase: N/A
• Study type: Interventional
• Enrollment: 514 (estimated)
• Sponsor: Centre Hospitalier Universitaire de Saint Etienne · Academic / Other
• Sex: All
• Age: 18 Years
• Healthy volunteers: Not accepted

Summary

Resuscitation patients are monitored for various physiological parameters. When these parameters exceed abnormal thresholds, an audible alarm is triggered. Given the complexity of physiological situations and the number of monitored parameters, the number of alarms within an intensive care unit is significant. In the literature, the number ranges from 100 to 350 alarms per patient per day. Among these alarms, 74 to 99% are deemed irrelevant as they provide false or insignificant information. This study will enable to assess the efficacy of a restrictive protocol for managing alarms as a means of rationalizing their use.

Detailed description

The large volume of unnecessary alarms has multiple negative repercussions. Firstly, the excessively loud sound environment present in most resuscitation services causes stress and discomfort for both patients and caregivers. Additionally, nurses become desensitised and less responsive when the number of alarms is high, particularly if many of them are ultimately pointless. Finally, multiple interruptions of tasks associated with alarms that require responses are sources of errors in the execution of care and medication preparation. These interruptions contribute to a phenomenon known as "alarm fatigue", which many authorsand health authorities consider a threat to patient safety.The intensive care unit of the Saint-Etienne University Hospital has had a long-standing interest in this topic, and has a computerized data collection tool that permits exhaustive analysis of all alarm signals originating from each resuscitation bed. This study will enable to assess the efficacy of a restrictive protocol for managing alarms as a means of rationalizing their use.

Conditions

• Intensive Care Unit

Interventions

Type	Name	Description
DEVICE	alarm management left to the discretion of the nurse	alarm management left to the discretion of the nurse in charge of the patient
DEVICE	restrictive alarm use strategy	more restrictive protocol for the use of alarms

Timeline

• Start date: 2024-02-08
• Primary completion: 2028-01-31
• Completion: 2028-02-28
• First posted: 2023-12-18
• Last updated: 2026-03-10

Locations

1 site across 1 country: France