Alarm customization improves nurse response times

Many hospitals use a secondary alarm notification system (SANS) to reduce alarm response times, but these systems often relay all alarms in the same manner. Researchers at The Ohio State University in Columbus customized a system to distinguish between emergency and other alarms. The addition of a beacon tone and digitized speech for alarms requiring immediate action improved nurse response times by 15% to 59%. The study findings were published in Human Factors. A separate effort in a burn intensive care unit in North Carolina also achieved notable improvements in alarm management. (HealthLeaders Media article, 8/2/21)