Editorial: Intentional rounding: unpacking the ritual, routine and evidence impasse

Abstract

There is little doubt that the organisation of nursing work significantly impacts care delivery and the quality of care received by patients. Historically, routine was a common feature of the organisation of nursing work, and nurse rounding was an accepted and routine feature of nursing practice. For more than three decades a strong thread in the nursing discourse has been the turn away from ritual and routine (Schmahl 1964, Kerr et al. 2011). This discourse resulted in widespread abandonment of nurse rounding. In recent years there have been calls for the reinstitution of routine nursing rounds. The current move to return to routine rounding, and its reinterpretation through the lens of patient benefit, particularly in preventing harm to patients, provides a strong case exemplar for the re-examination of routine in nursing practice.