Pozzoli Alberto, Zurfluh Chantal, Schulz Peter, Bianchi Monica, Giuffrida Silvia, Crivelli Diego, Torre Tiziano, Ferrari Enrico, Demertzis Stefanos
Division of Cardiac Surgery, Cardiocentro Ticino Institute, EOC, Lugano, Switzerland.
Department of Communication, Culture and Society, Università della Svizzera Italiana (USI), Lugano, Switzerland.
Front Cardiovasc Med. 2023 Jun 23;10:1165287. doi: 10.3389/fcvm.2023.1165287. eCollection 2023.
The COVID-19 pandemic entailed cutting off the usual access to hospitals, denying patients daily visits from their relatives and friends. The standard communication between medical staff and relatives also suffered, with a perceived negative impact on overall care. We developed an electronic communication solution to re-establish a proactive daily communication with patients' families.
The communication software allowed families to receive daily interprofessional (medical, nursing, and physiotherapy) updates by text message, on patients' postoperative clinical state. Appreciation and performance of this communication was evaluated through a prospective randomised study. Two groups were compared (group D, 32 patients "Digital" receiving daily SMS, and group S, 16 patients "Standard" without SMS), assessing satisfaction through dedicated surveys under COVID-19 restrictions. Moreover, private outgoing vs. incoming communication flow between patients and their relatives (phone calls and text messages, for both groups) were analysed at different timeframes of the postoperative hospital stay.
Mean age of the population was 66 ± 7 years for both groups. The digital communication service was successfully adopted in group D in all cases, sending overall 155 communications (4.84 per patient). Calls received from relatives were 13 in group D vs. 22 in group S (0.4 vs. 1.4 calls per patient, = 0.002). Patients' outgoing vs. incoming traffic flow was equal in the two groups for every timeframe (first two postoperative days vs. the rest), independently from digital communication. Comparing satisfaction of communication (from 1 to 7), level of information and understandability resulted in 6.7 in group D vs. 5.6 in group S ( = 0.004). Appreciation of digital communication was highest during the first three postoperative days.
The restrictions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic generated simple and effective ideas on digital solutions for interprofessional communication. Offering this digital service, which complements rather than replace the classic communication, eased the need of the families to be informed and significantly enhanced the overall satisfaction regarding the healthcare service.
The COVID-19 pandemic has interrupted access to hospital patients and cut off physical contact, denying patients, their families, and medical staff the necessary constant communication about the progress of their stay. It has become necessary, therefore, to compensate for the lack of "physical" face-to-face interaction by introducing innovative digital communication solutions. Our interprofessional project aims to assess the overall satisfaction and acceptance of digital communication service between the hospital and the families, updating on postoperative clinical condition of patients. Specifically, the introduction of a digital communication module attached to the electronic patient record allows relatives to be informed on a daily basis. The development of this module/software enabled families to receive daily, interprofessional and proactive digital updates, on their relative ones' postoperative stay.
新冠疫情导致医院的常规探视受限，患者无法每日与亲朋好友见面。医护人员与家属之间的标准沟通也受到影响，人们认为这对整体护理产生了负面影响。我们开发了一种电子通信解决方案，以重新与患者家属建立积极主动的日常沟通。
该通信软件允许家属通过短信接收关于患者术后临床状况的每日多专业（医疗、护理和物理治疗）更新信息。通过一项前瞻性随机研究评估这种沟通方式的满意度和效果。比较了两组（D组，32例患者“数字组”，每天接收短信；S组，16例患者“标准组”，不接收短信），在新冠疫情限制措施下通过专门调查评估满意度。此外，还分析了术后住院不同时间段患者与其亲属之间的私人外发与接收通信流量（两组均包括电话和短信）。
两组患者的平均年龄均为66±7岁。D组在所有情况下都成功采用了数字通信服务，共发送了155条信息（每位患者4.84条）。D组接到亲属的电话为13次，S组为22次（每位患者分别为0.4次和1.4次，P=0.002）。在每个时间段（术后前两天与其余时间），两组患者的外发与接收通信流量相等，与数字通信无关。比较沟通满意度（1至7分），信息水平和可理解性方面，D组为6.7分，S组为5.6分（P=0.004）。术后前三天对数字通信的评价最高。
新冠疫情造成的限制催生了关于多专业沟通数字解决方案的简单有效想法。提供这种数字服务，它是对传统沟通的补充而非替代，缓解了家属了解信息的需求，并显著提高了对医疗服务的总体满意度。
新冠疫情中断了对住院患者的探视并切断了身体接触，使患者、其家属和医护人员无法就患者住院进展进行必要的持续沟通。因此，有必要通过引入创新的数字通信解决方案来弥补“面对面”互动的不足。我们的多专业项目旨在评估医院与家属之间数字通信服务的总体满意度和接受度，提供患者术后临床状况的最新信息。具体而言，在电子病历中引入数字通信模块使亲属能够每日获取信息。该模块/软件的开发使家属能够每日收到关于其亲属术后住院情况的多专业主动数字更新。
