Patient outcomes
The results of this review relating to the effect of a team
nursing model on the incidence of falls remain inconclusive
as one study28 demonstrated significant decrease in the
number of falls at the 2-year follow up and no difference in
the 6-, 9- and 12-month follow up. In contrast, in the second
study,23 there was a higher incidence of falls in the team
nursing ward compared with the patient allocation ward.
This result could be due to the fact that the patient allocation
ward had all RNs and those in the team nursing ward had
nurses with varying skill levels.
In contrast to falls, wards that implemented the team
nursing model of care demonstrated significantly lower pain
scores24 and incidence of medication errors and adverse
intravenous outcomes at the 12- and 18-month follow
up.23,28 This reduction in the errors and adverse events could
be attributed to the increased time available for RNs to
educate patients about medications and intravenous
therapy.
Wards that used a hybrid model that was a combination of
patient allocation and team nursing models demonstrated
significant improvement in quality of patient care, reduction
in restraint use and rates of seclusion,7 but no difference in
incidence of pressure areas or infection rates.27 No significant
differences were found in model comparisons relating to
length of stay24 and aspects of patient satisfaction.24,26,28,30
Although indirectly related to patient outcomes, several
studies examined the quality of nursing documentation with
team nursing being superior to that of primary nursing
model,26 although one study22 found no difference. Early
discharge was also supported by a team nursing model.