Impact of a Novel Virtual Rounding Queue Software on Nurse and Family Presence for Rounds in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit: A Pilot Study.

Objective: Coordination to get everyone in the room at the same time for family-centered rounds (FCR) is challenging. The objective of this study was to determine if using a virtual queue that notifies nurses and families in real time when to expect the rounding team could impact their presence on rounds.

Methods: We observed rounds on two neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) teams for 6 weeks before and after implementation of a novel rounding software, Q-rounds, that shares real-time updates on when the team will arrive and allows families to répondez s'il vous plaît (RSVP) to join remotely when they cannot be there in person. Observers collected metrics pertinent to FCR including nurse and family presence (in-person or remotely) and duration of rounds and used Chi-square and two group t-tests for analysis.

Results: Rounds were observed for 165 patient encounters pre-implementation and 179 patient encounters post-implementation, with an average rounding duration of 10.3 minutes (SD 6.5) and 10.4 minutes (SD 6.3) per patient respectively (P = 0.91). The proportion of nurses who were present for the entirety of the rounding discussion increased from 18.8% to 58.2% (P < 0.001). Family presence on rounds increased from 20.0% (95% CI, 13.9-26.1) to 43.0% (95% CI, 35.8-50.3; P < 0.001). The percentage of families that participated in rounds remotely increased from 15.2% to 55.8% (P < 0.001).

Conclusions: This observational study showed that the use of a novel rounding software was associated with a significant increase in family presence for rounds and nurse presence for the entirety of rounds without increasing rounding duration.