Patient placement question — first 90 seconds
Confirm the request, location, order/status, and who owns the next step before escalating.
A unit, nurse, or coordinator is asking about a stalled bed assignment or transfer.
- 1First 90 seconds
Restate what they asked in one sentence, without PHI. Confirm which unit is waiting and where the patient is now.
- 2What to say
'Let me confirm the request, the status, and who owns the next step before we escalate.'
- 3What to check
Is there an active placement order or status? Is bed control aware? Is this one patient or several?
- 4When to escalate
If the placement is unclear after the request + status + owner check, or any time-critical workflow is waiting, escalate to command center with scope and severity.
- 5Command center handoff
Three sentences: what is stalled, scope and severity, what you need with a callback. Close the loop with the requester within 5 minutes.
- Speak calmly.
- Be specific.
- End with where you'll be.
- What happened.
- When it happened.
- Who was affected.
- • Escalating before confirming ownership.
- • Sharing patient identifiers on the floor.
- • Repeating a request without timestamping it.
Time-critical placement (ED holding, ICU transfer, post-op recovery) waiting > 15 minutes: page command center with scope, severity, callback.