Date of Award

Summer 2026

Abstract

Background: The perception of excess telemetry noise has a negative impact on nursing staff workflow, emotional stress, physical stress, and alarm fatigue. This can create a distressing workplace, interrupt the ability to answer telemetry alarms in an appropriate amount of time, and further worsen alarm fatigue in nursing staff.

Local Problem: The local problem identified was the perception of telemetry noise and alarm fatigue. The purpose of this study was to assess the extent of alarm fatigue and perception of telemetry noise on the unit.

Methods: The study consisted of an assessment of the microsystem itself and the observed impact of telemetry alarms to nursing staff, a conducted literature review on how alarm fatigue affects nursing staff, a presurvey and postsurvey for nursing staff completion, and an educational intervention of telemetry monitor guidelines. An educational infographic was created to be used as the intervention addressing the excess telemetry monitor alarms and alarm fatigue present on the unit. The Charité Alarm Fatigue Questionnaire, a nine-question survey with a Likert scale created by Dr. Anika Poncetta, was used as a presurvey and postsurvey, sent to nursing staff a week prior to and two weeks after the educational intervention was provided. The surveys reflected strong reliability and consistency, with a high Cronbach Alpha, as well as highly used in research papers. The data collected from the surveys was compared and analyzed using descriptive analysis and calculated using the Likert scale.

Results: The results provided evidence of reduced alarm fatigue and perception of telemetry noise in the microsystem. The results in the pre-survey had a mean of 15.4, while the results from the post-survey had a mean of 19.2, indicating a slight reduction in the perception of telemetry noise and alarm fatigue experienced by nursing staff.

Conclusion: Overall, the quality improvement project reflected a slight decrease of perception of noise and alarm fatigue in the microsystem. There was a limitation of the unequal sample size with presurvey and postsurvey responses that could potentially have an impact on this outcome.

Document Type

Master's Thesis

First Advisor

Elizabeth Evans

Second Advisor

Pamela Kallmerten

College or School

CHHS

Department or Program

Direct Entry Master's Nursing

Degree Name

Other

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