A Survey to Identify Potential Outcome Indicators for a Hospital Blood Glucose Monitoring Program

Objective: A survey of operators of a bedside blood glucose monitoring (BGM) program at a tertiary health care institution was performed to identify potential outcome indicators for our quality assurance program. Design and Methods: 170 surveys were randomly distributed to each nursing unit. The survey consisted of 20 questions on 4 pages. At the time of the survey, the BGM program consisted of 514 operators and 33 blood glucose meters on 17 inpatient nursing units servicing a total of 445 hospital beds. Results: Seventy-eight percent of surveys were returned. Seventy-one percent of operators used the glucose meter at least once a week, 17% used it less than once a week, and 12% used it less than once a month. When asked how often they thought operators should perform BGM to ensure reliability, 65% stated “at least monthly,” 8% said “bimonthly,” and 27% said “3 to 4 times a year.” In the previous 3 months, 59% of operators recalled “never having to repeat a BGM measurement with the glucose meter.” 56% recalled “never having to confirm a BGM result by sending a venous sample to the central laboratory;” 38% recalled “sending a venous sample once or twice;” 4% recalled “three or four times;” and 2% recalled “more than four times.” Fifty-two percent recalled having to perform a stat analysis “less than once per month,” 37% recalled “once or twice per month,” and 11% recalled “once or twice per week.” Conclusions: Through this survey we obtained information from our operators about the current functioning of our BGM program. Based on this information, we were able to develop a list of potential outcome indicators that we encourage health care institutions with BGM programs to consider incorporating in their quality assurance (QA) program.