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It’s 3 am. Your child just fell out of his bunk bed and now
has a large lump on his head. Do you take him to an emergency room
or use an ice pack?
Accidents and illnesses don’t wait for the morning - that is
why Beaver Medical Group introduced the after-hours Nurse Advice
Unit (NAU). This year, the NAU is celebrating its six year anniversary
and is staying busy with an average 4,000 calls per month.
Experienced Registered Nurses staff the phones to provide you with
medical information and answer questions that arise after physician’s
offices have closed for the day. The service is also available nights,
weekends and on all clinic holidays.
So if you or your child ever has an accident or illness at 3 am,
the NAU is there to help you. Just call any of Beaver Medical Group’s
main office numbers and you will be transferred to the NAU.
A nurse in the NAU will assess your symptoms and give advice for
you to follow.
“The NAU is there to help patients with symptoms that concern
them. The nurse discusses the symptoms with you, and then makes
educated decisions to get you to the appropriate level of care,”
said Larry Hoatson, the Director of the NAU.
The nurse will advise you regarding treatment. You may be relieved
to find out that you are able to wait to see your regular doctor
the next day. You may discover that the problem requires immediate
medical attention. You would then be instructed to either call 911
or go to the closest emergency room, depending on the severity of
the problem. Other times, a home remedy suggested by the nurse is
all that is needed.
The NAU uses special computer software to help evaluate the situation
and track patients. Nurses use their judgement and years of experience
to triage the patients, but the software is a helpful tool. It can
suggest questions to help evaluate the situation or raise red flags
that may indicate an emergency. All contacts are documented on the
software and sent to your chart for follow-up care with your primary
care physician.
Patients who have used the NAU in the last 6 years have been very
pleased with the service. The NAU Nurse Manager, Pat Beld, RN, said
“many patients are pleasantly surprised when they receive a
follow-up call from a NAU nurse or their doctor’s office.”
Certain patients receive check-up calls from the NAU the next day,
for example, for the child who did receive a head injury in the
night.
Sometimes parents receive follow-up calls within a few hours. A
parent with a child who has a moderately high fever could be instructed
to administer an exact amount of medication and to use a bath in
order to cool the child down. The nurse would then call back in
an hour or two to make sure the fever has broken, and is not worse.
What really makes the NAU an outstanding service are the caring
nurses that are experienced and do their job well. Remember that
the Registered Nurses of the Nurse Advice Unit are there to help
and will always be awake, whenever you are.
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