Making bedside handovers work for patients and staff

Good communication during handovers is an important aspect of nursing practice and there is growing acceptance that patients can and should be involved. But does bringing the handover to the bedside result in better care?

‘A handover is one of those nursing rituals that seems to work very differently depending on the ward and the person who is doing it,’ says Christine Norton, professor of nursing at the Florence Nightingale Faculty of Nursing and Midwifery, King’s College London.

Professor Norton was involved in research looking at the patient and staff experiences of various kinds of nurse handovers – including office-based and bedside – that was published in April 2016.

‘What we found was a mixed bag,’ she says. ‘We saw some very good practice, with caring and empathetic nurses, but others were doing a handover at the bedside without involving the