Words in a chart follow a person for years and become the next clinician’s attitude before they have met them. Each entry below was written by a real-sounding nurse in a hurry. Tap every word that is a judgement rather than an observation, check your flags, then choose the rewrite that a colleague could actually act on. The stigmatising phrases appear here only as the “before” you are fixing.
Entry 1 of 4
Progress note — as written
Tap the words that describe what the nurse concluded rather than what the nurse could see or hear.
Now choose the rewrite
What you flagged
Read the entry first.
Ask of every word: could a camera have recorded it? “Paced the corridor for fifteen minutes” — yes. “Attention-seeking” — no. The second one is a conclusion about a person’s motives, and it is contagious across a chart.
The entry the next nurse deserves
Rewritten noteIt will appear here once you have flagged the judgements and chosen a rewrite.
Two tests before you chart. If you would not say it to the person’s face, do not write it. If you would not want it read aloud in court, definitely do not write it.