Alarm Management Resources List

It its National Patient Safety Goal on Alarm Management (NPSG.06.01.01), the Joint Commission instructs hospitals to consult published best practices and guidelines to help determine the "most important alarm signals to manage." Unfortunately, there is no widespread consensus about approaches that constitute best practices for alarm management. In fact, within the NPSG itself the Joint Commission notes that "as alarm system management solutions are identified, this NPSG will be updated to reflect best practices."

In the absence of clear guidance, ECRI Institute recommends that you (1) look for recommendations from trusted organizations and (2) investigate ways to learn from the experiences of your peers. To help with that effort, ECRI Institute developed this starter list of resources. (The list was compiled in July 2014 for inclusion in the organization's Alarm Safety Handbook, discussed further below, and has not been updated.)

This list presents just some of the resources that team members can use to improve their understanding of alarm management issues and to learn about what other hospitals are doing. Additional materials will surely be developed as healthcare organizations and researchers work their way through this complicated issue. Thus team members should continue to keep an eye out for new materials as they are produced.

ECRI Institute offers a wide array of resources to help facilities improve clinical alarm safety. They can be accessed from our Alarm Management: The Essentials page. Versions of these resources are also consolidated into two publications, the Alarm Safety Handbook...