7 ways to reduce alarm fatigue in hospitals

Let’s face it—hospitals are noisy and distracting places to work. Without an effective alarm management strategy, clinicians experience sensory overload, or alert fatigue, from excessive beeps and buzzes from cardiac monitors, ventilators, and other machines. If they become desensitized and assume that critical notifications are false, they are setting the stage for adverse events. 

The Joint Commission estimates nearly all (up to 99%) alarms from mass notification systems do not require medical attention. With this information in mind, it’s time to rethink how your healthcare organization delivers information to its care teams. Here are seven ways to effectively tackle alert fatigue while improving patient safety and boosting clinician satisfaction.  

1. Conduct an alert assessment on each unit 

Each hospital unit faces challenges that demand specific solutions. A thorough evaluation of your medical alert systems can identify what is required to reduce background noise on every floor. By uncovering patterns, such as frequent false alarms or delayed responses, you can make targeted improvements and alleviate alert fatigue. 

2. Clean and monitor equipment 

Simply cleaning and replacing electrodes ensures that everything works properly while limiting the number of alarms related to technical difficulties from mass notification systems. It’s generally recommended to regularly replace single-use sensors and set routine schedules for inspecting and maintaining equipment. 

3. Decrease clinically inconsequential alerts  

Alarms are meant to inform care teams when medical intervention is necessary. However, too many beeps and buzzes can intensify patient anxiety and alert fatigue among your employees. Adjusting your monitors’ thresholds can remove non-actionable notifications, creating a quieter environment and improving clinician responsiveness.  

4. Tailor alerts to patient characteristics 

Customizing device parameters for each patient based on their specific conditions can eliminate overwhelming alarms from your medical alert systems. This approach ensures that notifications reflect clinical relevance—what’s urgent for one patient may not be critical for another.  

5. Route the right message to the right person 

Sending alerts from patient monitoring devices directly to the correct clinician’s preferred device is an effective way to improve your alarm management procedures and reduce overhead announcements. Your care teams can then achieve faster response times for more effective patient care.  

6. Triage alerts with software  

Clinical alerting software leverages predefined priority levels and ensures that the most critical signals are delivered first. Nurses will only receive notifications that require immediate attention on their mobile devices, silencing unnecessary noise and improving their focus. Escalation paths can also be customized to guarantee that urgent alerts are promptly addressed if not acknowledged right away.  

7. Ensure proper training about monitoring devices 

Advanced monitoring devices in today’s hospitals require care teams to be well-versed in sensor management, patient skin preparation, and customizing alert parameters. Healthcare organizations should implement ongoing training procedures, informing their care teams about new alerting software, system updates, and evolving alarm management protocols.  

Alert fatigue is a serious challenge impacting patient safety and clinician well-being, but creating an effective action plan can feel intimidating without a clear starting point. This eBook offers practical insights and proven strategies to help your healthcare organization address this workplace problem effectively and confidently.  

Topic: Alarm fatigue