1 8 • O U T PA T I E N T S U R G E R Y M A G A Z I N E • D E C E M B E R 2 0 1 9
N
ear the end
of the day, 6
recovery
room nurses were
standing around the
PACU desk chatting
it up. Not one of
them was doing
chart reviews or
making follow-up
calls or doing, well,
anything at all. They
were simply biding their time until the shift was over instead of mak-
ing the most of even the tiniest windows of extra time. How? By fol-
lowing the 2-Minute Rule.
In the world of self-help, the 2-Minute Rule refers to bestselling
author (Getting Things Done) David Allen's philosophy that if a task
on your to-do list takes less than 2 minutes to accomplish, you should
do it right away and avoid putting it off. Here are just a few of the
tasks your staff can accomplish in a mere 120 seconds of downtime.
Make a single follow-up phone call. With overall patient experi-
ence playing a pivotal role for outpatient facilities everywhere,
staff should always make follow-up phone calls. This is a perfect task
to knock out if you find yourself with 2 minutes to spare. To avoid
wasting your time during these rare windows of downtime, make sure
to set yourself up for success during the admission process. You
1
Knock Tasks Down With the 2-Minute Rule
You and your staff can get a lot done in 120-second increments.
Staffing
Ann Geier, MS, RN, CNOR, CASC
• DOWNTIME If your staff has a few minutes of downtime between cases, it's a prime
opportunity to knock out small but critical tasks.
