Resource Nurse, Nights

Company Description

The University of Maryland Medical System is a 14-hospital system with academic, community, and specialty medical services reaching every part of Maryland and beyond. UMMS is a national and regional referral center for trauma, cancer care, Neurocare, cardiac care, women’s and children’s health, and physical rehabilitation. UMMS is the fourth largest private employer in the Baltimore metropolitan area and one of the top 20 employers in the state of Maryland. No organization will give you the clinical variety, the support, or the opportunities for professional growth that you’ll enjoy as a member of our team.

Job Description

The Resource Nurse is responsible for providing direct support to all members of the nursing division, including new hires, nurse leaders, and all nursing services at UM Shore Regional Health (UMSRH), to ensure safe, high-quality, and compassionate patient care. The Resource Nurse provides expert-level bedside education, coaching, mentoring, and guidance in the care of patients, families, the community, and in collaboration with the healthcare team. The facilitator serves as a clinical expert/resource for the nursing team, communicating regularly with the charge nurse, manager, director, educator, nurse resident, new nursing service hires, and preceptors to ensure the successful transition of all new nursing hires into the organization. The Resource nurse also serves as a clinical safety net for patients through proactive rounding to support recognition of “at-risk” patients, with face-to-face (or phone) interaction with staff. Rounding is focused on deterioration and decreasing morbidity or mortality of hospitalized patients by recognizing deterioration and quickly stabilizing patients throughout the hospital who are at risk for neurologic, cardiovascular, and/or respiratory decompensation and/or instability. Rounding includes clinical assessment and guidance for patient care in situations of low volume/high risk situations or care of patients in designated holding, observation or overflow areas. The Resource Nurse supports determining the need for rapid response assistance for advanced assessment and emergency management, assistance with communication with providers and other healthcare team members, and, as necessary, assistance with transfer to a higher level of care. The Resource nurse responds to all Medical Emergencies, Code Blue, Brain Attacks, and clinical emergency alerts. The position requires expert-level Critical Care (CC) competency. The Resource Nurse reports to the Patient Care Services Manager, Operations.

Principal Duties:

1. Monitors knowledge, skills, abilities, behaviors, and role of the professional nurse to provide feedback and coaching to the new grad and new hire and the orientation team (manager/educator/preceptor/director).
2. Monitor and round on all adult inpatient units and the Emergency Department (ED) or Post Anesthesia Care Unit (PACU) “boarder” patients. Areas include observation, medical, surgical, critical care, heart and vascular, adult obstetrics, and inpatient/outpatient PACU. Rounding on psychiatry is at the request of the unit charge nurse.
3. Review of patients identified “at risk” using the NEWS score, vital signs, lab results, diagnostic results, and use of antibiotics or supplemental O2. Additional consideration of high-risk patients includes, but is not limited to, patients requiring non-invasive positive pressure ventilation (NIPPV), high-flow nasal cannula, peritoneal dialysis, tracheostomy care, chest tubes, or those who have recently returned from a procedure/recovery area with or without sedation.
4. Rounds on patients transferred from the critical care unit or higher level of care within the last 24 hours.
5. Supports the bedside RN to assess patients for normal vital signs (VS) or diagnostic trends to note changes that may require further evaluation. In non-urgent deteriorating patients, reviews the potential causes of abnormal VS/trends/diagnostics.
6. When a patient needs a higher level of care and a bed is not immediately available, the Resource nurse stays to assist with patient management and expedite necessary treatment interventions until the patient is transferred.
7. The Resource Nurse documents assessments, treatments, interventions, communication and care delivered by the Resource Nurse in all aspects of the Medical Record as care is completed.
8. The Resource nurse is a mentor for staff to include, but not limited to the following:
   • Recognition of abnormal vital signs, laboratory, or diagnostic results
   • Further assessment
   • SBAR communication, including having patient data/information available for prompt retrieval when communicating with providers and other members of the healthcare team.
   • Escalating concerns that are not addressed
   • Ability to recognize and follow up with ad