Assessing deteriorating patients: what you need to know

How do you use early warning scores to optimum effect when assessing the deteriorating patient?

When should you refer a person in your care to a more senior member of the team, and in what circumstances must you immediately escalate a case?

The latest episode of the Nursing Standard podcast discusses these issues as we explore early warning scores. Tools such as the National Early Warning Score (NEWS2) help nurses and other healthcare professionals to assess when a patient’s condition is worsening following a structured and prioritised approach, such as airway, breathing, circulation, disability and exposure (ABCDE) and whose scores indicate what action to take.

This episode hears from Cardiff University senior lecturer in adult nursing Andy Parry, who has a background in critical care and anaesthetics and regularly teaches early warning scores.

Mr Parry talks to interviewer RCNi senior nurse editor Richard Hatchett about what the different scales of the early warning scores mean and the importance of a thorough assessment. The pair also discuss why respiratory rate is a sensitive indicator of deterioration, and how it can pick up signs of possible impending cardiac arrest sooner than alterations in blood pressure.

https://rcni.com/rcniplus/topics/early-warning-scores

https://journals.rcni.com/nursing-standard/evidence-and-practice/effective-handovers-on-escalation-of-care-for-the-deteriorating-patient-ns.2023.e12078/print/abs

https://rcni.com/nursing-standard/features/what-abcde-and-why-it-important-162311

https://rcni.com/nursing-standard/students/nursing-studies/what-news2-and-how-can-it-help-prevent-cardiac-arrest-195531

For more episodes of the Nursing Standard podcast, visit rcni.com/podcast

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