Research Paper on:
Education Program Proposal

Unformatted Sample Text from the Research Paper:
for an innovation that will increase hospital efficiency while also increasing knowledge of diabetes management among both nurses and patients. Currently, insulin IV drip is only given in the  ICU, "and when a patient on the regular medical unit develops blood glucose of over 400 mg/dl, he needs to be transferred to the ICU to receive treatment. This  procedure becomes problematic when there is no bed available in the ICU, which is a common scenario. When this is the case, the most stable ICU patient must be  transferred out of ICU, or if there is no good candidate for that action, the patient whose blood glucose is elevated must be treated "on the regular unit with SQ  insulin coverage." The purpose here is to contribute to the development of an educational unit "to educate the nurses on the medical unit on the effectiveness of insulin IV  therapy." Objectives include: * Maintenance of glucose levels at 100-150 mg/dl; * Decreased length of stay; and * Decreased morbidity and mortality in diabetes population.  Program goals include (1) enabling insulin IV drip on the medical ward, rather than transferring the patient to ICU; (2) assisting patients to gain and maintain control  over their blood glucose levels; and (3) encouraging continuous improvement in nursing knowledge and patient education. The programs theoretical base is a combination of planned behavior and the health-belief  model in which the patient believes a problem exists and that treatment is effective (Caserta, 1995). Program description. Primary instruction for  nurses will be in a classroom setting where the main focus will be physiological review. The focus will be on management and delaying insulin support, encouraging blood glucose control