Health Safety

The SpeakUp program, sponsored by The Joint Commission, emphasizes that parents should be involved in their child’s care. Research shows that children whose parents take part in decisions about their child’s care are more likely to get better faster.

Ask your child’s nurse for a copy of the SpeakUp brochure, which details specific things you can do to help prevent errors and keep your child safe. 

Stony Brook Children’s Hospital created a Rapid Response Team (RRT) — a group of critical care specialists or senior residents accompanied by respiratory therapists. This team is available to provide urgent, lifesaving intervention in the event a patient shows signs of a sudden change in his or her medical condition. 

The bedside nurse is specially trained to recognize signs of distress, but we realize that a patient’s family member may be the first to witness symptoms. To dispatch the RRT, call 321 on a hospital or patient bedside phone, or (631) 444-1077 on a cell phone. The team will respond promptly to the patient’s bedside.

Ask a member of our staff and review our Rapid Response Team brochure. 

The hospital is an unfamiliar place for you and your child, so we take extra care to keep you safe.

Please note that because we clean the floors frequently, the floors may be slippery, so we ask patients to wear shoes or hospital-provided socks with grips at all times. Also, please keep your child from running in the halls. If you have an infant/toddler, please keep the crib side rails up at all times.

Your child may also receive medication that may cause drowsiness or impaired coordination — so pay special attention at these times to prevent falls. If your child does fall, immediately alert the staff. 

Pain relief is an important part of your child’s healthcare, recovery and comfort. Controlling pain can help your child get well faster. Less pain will help your child regain strength more quickly and allow him or her to resume normal function sooner. 

Please alert the staff if your child is not receiving relief from pain medication, is having breathing problems or any other reaction which may be medication related. 

Please know we need to frequently monitor your child for pain, which may involve waking them as needed to assess their response to medications. 

At Stony Brook Children’s, we strongly believe that children should experience minimal pain, which is why we have developed “ouchless medicine,” a series of measures to keep children as comfortable and as pain-free as possible. 

The goal is to combine as many tests as possible so that the child has fewer procedures: 

• giving oral fluids instead of an IV when safe and appropriate
• using special numbing cream on the child’s skin to greatly reduce pain from a needle
• bundling all the painful tests, such as blood drawing and IV insertion, into one “stick”
• using special painkilling and sedative medications during more serious procedures

• Share list of all your child’s current medicines, vitamins, herbs and supplements with your child’s healthcare provider. 
• Know what medications your child is receiving in the hospital and why.
• Ask your healthcare provider how a new medicine will help. Ask about possible side effects. Ask for written information about the medicine, including its brand and generic names. 
• Tell your healthcare provider if your child doesn’t feel well after receiving a medicine. If you think he or she is having a reaction or experiencing side effects, ask for help immediately. 
• Don’t be afraid to tell your child’s healthcare provider if you think your child is about to get the wrong medicine. 
• Remind your child’s healthcare provider about allergies that your child has or negative reactions he or she has had to other medicines. 
• Be aware that your child’s healthcare providers will be checking your child’s wristband and asking for his or her name and date of birth prior to procedures or administering medications. 
• Before you leave the hospital, make sure that you understand all of the instructions for the medicines your child will need to keep taking and the medicines he or she will no longer need to take. Ask any questions you may have about any of his or her medications. 
• Read your child’s prescription medicine label. Make sure that it has your child’s name on it and the correct medicine name and dosage. Make sure that your child’s medication looks the same as it normally does. If something doesn’t match, ask your child’s healthcare provider immediately. 
• Administer your child’s medicine as prescribed. Don't not stop administering it without first speaking with your child’s healthcare provider. 
• If your child receives a prescription for antibiotics, use all the medication as prescribed until it is finished. 

We can’t say it enough. Hand washing is one of the best ways to prevent the spread of infection. This is particularly important during hospitalization, when patients are at their most vulnerable and may have low immunity. 

For your child’s safety and the safety of your visitors, we request that you help spread the word to perform hand hygiene before and after entering a patient’s room/area, before and after every patient contact, and before and after eating and using the bathroom. This means either using antibacterial foam or washing hands thoroughly at the sink. 

HOW TO WASH YOUR HANDS:  Lather your hands with soap and water for as long as it takes to sing “Happy Birthday” twice. Use a paper towel when turning off the water. Then dry hands thoroughly. 

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In the hospital, certain infections may require isolation to keep them from spreading to other patients. If this is the case with your child, do not be alarmed. It is a standard safety procedure that involves taking precautions. This may include changing rooms and limiting visitors.

During your child’s hospitalization, one or more of their laboratory cultures may show that he or she is carrying or is infected with bacteria or an organism that is resistant to usual antibiotics. When this occurs, your child will be placed on disease-specific precautions. These protective measures are required for all healthcare workers to prevent or limit the spread to other patients. Your child’s room may be changed. Your child will also be placed on disease-specific precautions at each of his or her subsequent admissions until it is proven that he or she not carrying or infected with the identified bacteria. 

Your child’s family members and visitors do not have to follow special precautions unless instructed to do so by a healthcare provider. Before entering the room, they should ask your nurse for specific instructions. They should wash their hands with soap and water or foam when entering and leaving the room, and should not go into other patient rooms and common areas in the unit. While in the room, if they need to sneeze or cough, they should do so into their elbow, not their hand. If they are using a tissue, they should discard it and wash hands. Family members and visitors should take as few personal items as possible into the room and store them away from your child. They should not touch items used for your child’s care, including medical devices, tubes or dressings. 

The doctor, nurse and the infection control practitioner assigned to your child’s area can provide you with specific and additional information regarding the isolation.

For additional information or to speak with one of the practitioners, call the Healthcare Epidemiology Department at (631) 444-7430, Monday through Friday, 8 am to 4:30 pm.