• Wei Liu, Elizabeth Manias, and Marie Gerdtz.
• Department of Nursing, Melbourne School of Health Sciences, The University of Melbourne, Level 2, Walter Boas Building, Parkville 3010, Australia. wei.liu10@gmail.com
• Int J Nurs Stud. 2012 Aug 1;49(8):941-52.

BackgroundCommunication is central to safe medication management. Handover is a routine communication forum where nurses provide details about how patients' medications are managed. Previous studies have investigated handover processes as general communication forums without specific focus on medication information exchange. The effects of social, environmental and organisational contexts on handover communication and medication safety have not been explored.ObjectivesTo examine dominant and submissive forms of communication and power relations surrounding medication communication among nurses, and between nurses and patients during handover.DesignA critical ethnographic approach was utilised to unpack the social and power struggles embedded in handover practices.SettingsThe study was conducted in two medical wards of a metropolitan teaching hospital in Melbourne, Australia from January to November 2010.ParticipantsAll registered nurses employed in the medical wards during the study time were eligible for participation. Patients were eligible if they were able to communicate with nurses about how their medications were managed. In total, 76 nurses and 27 patients were recruited for the study after giving written consent for participation.MethodsParticipant observations, field interviews, video-recordings and video reflexive focus groups were conducted. Fairclough's critical discourse analytic framework guided data analysis.ResultsNurse coordinators' group handovers in private spaces prioritised organisational and biomedical discourses, with little emphasis on evaluating the effectiveness of medication treatment. The ward spatial structure provided an added complexity to how staff allocation occurred. Handovers involving patients in the public spaces at the bedside facilitated a partnership model in medication communication. Nurses exercised discretion during bedside handovers by discussing sensitive information away from the bedside. Handovers across different wards during patient transfers caused communication breakdowns because information was not exchanged between bedside nurses.ConclusionsNurse coordinators need to relinquish organisational control of the handover practice and appreciate the contribution of bedside nurses to patient information exchange. Bedside nurses need to be provided with opportunities to raise questions during the group handover. Designated meeting spaces need to be provided to reduce interruptions to the group handover process.Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

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