How does your facility flag blind patients?

1 There is the obvious, reminding staff during report. But what about housekeeping staff or dietary when they do their rounds? Do you have a policy for flagging the charts? Doors? I appreciate any input.
Flagging charts really does not help since dietary and housekeeping does not have access to charts.As for putting a sign on the door...at one of the facilities where I worked--the used to put the organism on isolations signs--i.e. they would put "MRSA" on the sign rather that just "contact isolation." The IC nurse said that they could no longer put the organism on the sign (that was hung on the door) because this was a HIPAA violation. If this is true, I'm guessing putting a sign that says "blind" on the hallway side of the door would be a HIPAA violation. I have seen signs above the bed so that staff does not rearrange the items in the room.

At our facility we use laminated signs depicting pictures of "falling leaves" to designate Fall Risk patients. I am concerned that we are going to end up with a road map of silly pictures to designate everything management thinks we need to flag, so I'm just looking for some kind of workable, reasonable alternative.

We have big yellow 'sight impared' signs that go on the wall behind the patients bed (we have open wards so its instantly visable)

Quote from notjustanurseAt our facility we use laminated signs depicting pictures of "falling leaves" to designate Fall Risk patients. I am concerned that we are going to end up with a road map of silly pictures to designate everything management thinks we need to flag, so I'm just looking for some kind of workable, reasonable alternative.

Quote from notjustanurseAt our facility we use laminated signs depicting pictures of "falling leaves" to designate Fall Risk patients. I am concerned that we are going to end up with a road map of silly pictures to designate everything management thinks we need to flag, so I'm just looking for some kind of workable, reasonable alternative.

Quote from amoLuciaWe had 'falling stars' and cactuses (cacti?) for fluid restrictions on doorframes. We weren't allowed in many of my last LTC places to have any wall signs - something about pt dignity (and probably HIPAA). Yeah - like how much dignity was there when food trays were left untouched on bedside tables .... I think that's another reason why they came out with the pink bracelets for "NO venipuncture/BPs" for dialysis or mastectectomy pts. They stuck a yellow "falls risk" bracelet on me when I went for outpt testing as I use a cane now pre-knee surgery. We all know what the colors mean, so where's the PRIVACY?!?!? Funny, but nobody knows what my blue " anti-domestic violence" bracelet designates!!!

We don't flag blind patients. Why would housekeeping or dietary need to know that? (we do tray set up ourselves)

An interesting thought, but unnecessary, IMO. We had purple magnets on doors to designate fall risk. Green to designate no English. Red equals NPO, etc. My experience shows no one really pays attention. So adding a "blind" magnet won't really help...

I had a blind patient a couple of weeks ago. I gave him the nurse's call button and told him not to get up without calling me. I moved his finger to the big red button on the control. He said, "Oh I see, this one said nurse, this one said TV." He could read Braille!! I had forgotten there were braille letters on the button. I was so exited, I almost peed on myself! I had never met someone who can read braille before. I think it was because he was blind from birth. Most people get blinded because of diabetes and other things in adulthood.

Quote from BrandonLPNAn interesting thought, but unnecessary, IMO. We had purple magnets on doors to designate fall risk. Green to designate no English. Red equals NPO, etc. My experience shows no one really pays attention. So adding a "blind" magnet won't really help...

We used different color socks, for example red = fall risk. It was almost fail proof, as pretty much everyone's little tootsies are freezing while they are admitted.

We have an ADL sheet above everyone's bed with pertinent info on it -- how they transfer, toilet, eat -- that are updated daily (in theory) and serve as a quick reference for staff who may answer a bell but don't know the patient. Information like "blind" or "hard of hearing" would also be included.