How veterinary nurses can save time on the floor

Nursing time often goes missing between one task and the next. You check whether a patient is in prep, whether bloods are back, whether an item was actually dispensed, or whether discharge paperwork is still outstanding. A whiteboard can help for part of that, but if it stops matching the computer then the team ends up checking both.

The practical answer is to use one live board in the system and to work with the same browser habits the front desk uses. Open the patient in a new tab, keep the board visible, and place two windows side by side when you need to compare the record with a result or PDF. That helps a nurse finish the treatment task in front of them without losing sight of the rest of the inpatients.

Use Active Cases as the live inpatient board

Active Cases works best when the whole team treats it as the main view of who is currently in the practice. Patients can move through waiting, consult, admit, discharge and payment as their status changes. That gives nurses a reliable list to work from, instead of trying to remember whether the wall board or the diary is the most up to date.

Pin the board so it stays available, then open the patient record in a new tab when you need to work on a case. If possible, keep the board on one side of the screen and the patient on the other. On a proper reception or prep-room monitor this is straightforward. If the only option is a small laptop on a narrow worktop, staff will usually drift back to paper because they cannot see enough at once. That is a setup issue, not a training failure.

Keep observations and lab results on the patient record

Weights, temperatures, pain scores and other observations are easier to trust when they are entered directly onto the patient record with a proper history. That is better than writing them on scraps of paper and trying to copy them into the notes later. It also makes handover safer because the next nurse can see the same information without chasing whoever was on earlier.

Lab results are most useful when they sit on the consult with ranges and flags visible. Where the relevant connection is available, IDEXX or Antech results can post into the system. That saves the late afternoon job of checking a separate lab portal and filing PDFs by hand. If you do need to read a long result or an attached PDF, search within it before you scroll through pages looking for one value.

Let dispensing and stock updates do part of the closing work

Dispensing is quicker when the record of what left the shelf also updates the stock level and lot information. If those things are disconnected, the team ends up doing the same job twice, once at the time of dispense and again during stock checking. Low-stock alerts are only useful if somebody actually owns the list, but they are still easier to act on than trying to remember what looked short at the end of the day.

For repeat work, treatment plans and staged checklists can also help if they reflect jobs your practice already runs regularly. They are useful for routine pathways and clear handovers. They are less useful if staff are expected to build new protocols on the spot in the middle of a busy shift.

Finish discharge with the record still in front of you

Discharge becomes slower when staff have to hunt for home sheets, remember follow-up advice from memory, and then work out whether anything was actually sent. If the discharge document can go by email or through the portal, the patient record keeps a clearer history of what was provided. If the owner wants a printed copy to take away, that is still fine, but it helps if the same information is also stored properly on the case.

• Pin Active Cases so the live board stays visible through the shift.
• Open the patient you are handling in a new tab instead of replacing the board.
• Use two windows side by side for the board and record, or the record and a lab PDF.
• Use search or find for a drug name, lot number, accession number or chip number before scrolling.
• Reopen a closed tab with Ctrl Shift T or Cmd Shift T if the board disappears.