We all know that nurse to nurse familiarity is important for teamwork and outcomes in critical care.
This familiarity helps the cohesion of the unit and helps nurse retention when coupled with safe staffing ratios.
Some things in medicine are known but it’s still nice when reinforced by data.
In October of last year year an article was published titled “Nurse-to-Nurse Familiarity and Mortality in the Critically Ill. A Multicenter Observational Study”.
Hat tip to the authors. Try to read these data for yourself.
Let’s get straight to the point.
They looked at nurse familiarity with patient deaths.
The authors used fancy statistics retrospectively to provide evidence that an increased familiarity between the nurses led to fewer bad outcomes.
The other crucial piece of data extrapolated from this is that if the ratios were defined as “suboptimal”, the rate of deaths increased here as well.
Let’s reiterate things we already knew: working with people we know is great. A byproduct is that it improves retention. This, in turn will lead to better outcomes for our patients.
The icing on the cake of this paper is that safe staffing ratios saves patient lives.
Let’s also not forget how to appreciate our nurses.

Citations for Nurse Familiarity

Duclos A, Payet C, Baboi L, Allaouchiche B, Argaud L, Aubrun F, Bohé J, Dailler F, Fellahi JL, Lehot JJ, Piriou V, Rimmelé T, Terragrossa D, Polazzi S, Guérin C. Nurse-to-Nurse Familiarity and Mortality in the Critically Ill: A Multicenter Observational Study. Am J Respir Crit Care Med. 2023 Apr 15;207(8):1022-1029. doi: 10.1164/rccm.202204-0696OC. PMID: 36219472.
Link to Article (NOT FREE)

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