Exploring indicators of telephone nursing quality

To explore whether documentation, use of clinical guidelines. and nurse com petency are the best indicators of quality telephone nursing, this study ex amined the relationship between these commonly cited indicators and the cha racteristics of a telephone nursing call. This study, done at a large healt h maintenance organization (HMO), found: accompanying symptoms played a maj or role In telephone nursing assessment; call length was related to documen tation process and to number of visits to a health care facility after a ca ll; nurses' interpersonal skills and ability to determine urgency of a call are related to the documentation process but not to outcomes of the call; time of a call is related to disposition; and disposition is related to num ber of visits after a call.