Dataset Information

Question design in nurse-led and GP-led telephone triage for same-day appointment requests: a comparative investigation.

ABSTRACT:

Objective

To compare doctors' and nurses' communication with patients in primary care telephone triage consultations.

Design

Qualitative comparative study of content and form of questions in 51 telephone triage encounters between practitioners (general practitioners (GPs)=29; nurses=22) and patients requesting a same-day appointment in primary care. Audio-recordings of nurse-led calls were synchronised with video recordings of nurse's use of computer decision support software (CDSS) during triage.

Setting

2 GP practices in Devon and Warwickshire, UK.

Participants

4 GPs and 29 patients; and 4 nurses and 22 patients requesting a same-day face-to-face appointment with a GP.

Main outcome measure

Form and content of practitioner-initiated questions and patient responses during clinical assessment.

Results

A total of 484 question-response sequences were coded (160 GP; 324 N). Despite average call lengths being similar (GP=4 min, 37 s, (SD=1 min, 26 s); N=4 min, 39 s, (SD=2 min, 22 s)), GPs and nurses differed in the average number (GP=5.51, (SD=4.66); N=14.72, (SD=6.42)), content and form of questions asked. A higher frequency of questioning in nurse-led triage was found to be due to nurses' use of CDSS to guide telephone triage. 89% of nurse questions were oriented to asking patients about their reported symptoms or to wider-information gathering, compared to 54% of GP questions. 43% of GP questions involved eliciting patient concerns or expectations, and obtaining details of medical history, compared to 11% of nurse questions. Nurses using CDSS frequently delivered questions designed as declarative statements requesting confirmation and which typically preferred a 'no problem' response. In contrast, GPs asked a higher proportion of interrogative questions designed to request information.

Conclusions

Nurses and GPs emphasise different aspects of the clinical assessment process during telephone triage. These different styles of triage have implications for the type of information available following nurse-led or doctor-led triage, and for how patients experience triage.

SUBMITTER: Murdoch J

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3948453 | biostudies-literature | 2014 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

ACCESS DATA

Publications

Question design in nurse-led and GP-led telephone triage for same-day appointment requests: a comparative investigation.

Murdoch Jamie J Barnes Rebecca R Pooler Jillian J Lattimer Val V Fletcher Emily E Campbell John L JL

BMJ open 20140305 3

<h4>Objective</h4>To compare doctors' and nurses' communication with patients in primary care telephone triage consultations.<h4>Design</h4>Qualitative comparative study of content and form of questions in 51 telephone triage encounters between practitioners (general practitioners (GPs)=29; nurses=22) and patients requesting a same-day appointment in primary care. Audio-recordings of nurse-led calls were synchronised with video recordings of nurse's use of computer decision support software (CDS ...[more]

PMID: 24598305

Similar Datasets

Project description:ObjectivesOut-of-hours (OOH) telephone triage is used to manage patient flow, but knowledge of the communicative skills of telephone triagists is limited. The aims of this study were to compare communicative parameters in general practitioner (GP)-led and nurse-led OOH telephone triage and to discuss differences in relation to patient-centred communication and safety issues.DesignObservational study.SettingTwo Danish OOH settings: a large-scale general practitioner cooperative in the Central Denmark Region (n=100 GP-led triage conversations) and Medical Helpline 1813 in the Capital Region of Denmark (n=100 nurse-led triage conversations with use of a clinical decision support system).Participants200 audio-recorded telephone triage conversations randomly selected.Primary and secondary outcome measuresConversations were compared with regard to length of call, distribution of speaking time, question types, callers' expression of negative affect, and nurses' and GPs' responses to callers' negative affectivity using the Mann-Whitney U test and the Student's t-test.ResultsCompared with GPs, nurses had longer telephone contacts (137s vs 264 s, p=0.001) and asked significantly more questions (5 vs 9 questions, p=0.001). In 36% of nurse-led triage conversations, triage nurses either transferred the call to a physician or had to confer the call with a physician. Nurses gave the callers significantly more spontaneous talking time than GPs (23.4s vs 17.9 s, p=0.01). Compared with nurses, GPs seemed more likely to give an emphatic response when a caller spontaneously expressed concern; however, this difference was not statistically significant (36% vs 29%, p=0.6).ConclusionsWhen comparing communicative parameters in GP-led and nurse-led triage, several differences were observed. However, the impact of these differences in the perspective of patient-centred communication and safety needs further research. More knowledge is needed to determine what characterises good quality in telephone triage communication.

Project description:Several care transition interventions propose that post-discharge phone calls can reduce adverse events and decrease costly return visits to the hospital. However, given the multi-faceted nature of most care transitions interventions, the true relationship between post-discharge phone calls and readmissions in a real world setting is uncertain.To determine the effect of receiving a post-discharge telephone call on all-cause 30-day readmission in a general medicine population.Retrospective observational study.Patients discharged home from the Medicine Service at a tertiary care academic medical center between November 2010 and May 2012.Patients received two telephone call attempts by a nurse within 72 h of discharge. Nurses followed a standard script to address issues associated with readmission.Billing data captured readmissions. We used logistic regression-adjusted patient and clinical covariates as well as a propensity score representing likelihood of being called to determine the association between call receipt and risk for readmission.There were 5,507 eligible patients. In unadjusted analyses, patients who received a call and completed the intervention were significantly less likely to be readmitted compared to those who did not [155 (5.8 %) vs 123 (8.6 %), p?<?0.01]. In multivariable models adjusting for socio-demographic and clinical covariates alone, completing a post-discharge telephone call intervention was associated with lower odds for readmission (AOR 0.71; 95 % CI: 0.55-0.91). However, when models adjusted for the likelihood of receiving the phone call using the propensity score, no association between call receipt and readmission was observed (AOR 0.91; 95%CI: 0.69-1.20).Effectiveness of post-discharge phone call programs may be more related to whether patients are able to answer a phone call than to the care delivered by the phone call. Programs would benefit from improving their ability to perform phone outreach while simultaneously improving on the care delivered during the calls.

Project description:ImportanceFamilies often struggle after discharge of a child from the hospital. Postdischarge challenges can lead to increased use of urgent health care services.ObjectiveTo determine whether a single nurse-led telephone call after pediatric discharge decreased the 30-day reutilization rate for urgent care services and enhanced overall transition success.Design, setting, and participantsThis Hospital-to-Home Outcomes (H2O) randomized clinical trial included 966 children and adolescents younger than 18 years (hereinafter referred to as children) admitted to general medicine services at a free-standing tertiary care children's hospital from May 11 through October 31, 2016. Data were analyzed as intention to treat and per protocol.InterventionsA postdischarge telephone call within 4 days of discharge compared with standard discharge.Main outcomes and measuresThe primary outcome was the 30-day reutilization rate for urgent health care services (ie, unplanned readmission, emergency department visit, or urgent care visit). Secondary outcomes included additional utilization measures, as well as parent coping, return to normalcy, and understanding of clinical warning signs measured at 14 days.ResultsA total of 966 children were enrolled and randomized (52.3% boys; median age [interquartile range], 2.4 years [0.5-7.8 years]). Of 483 children randomized to the intervention, the nurse telephone call was completed for 442 (91.5%). Children in the intervention and control arms had similar reutilization rates for 30-day urgent health care services (intervention group, 77 [15.9%]; control group, 63 [13.1%]; P = .21). Parents of children in the intervention group recalled more clinical warning signs at 14 days (mean, 1.8 [95% CI, 1.7-2.0] in the intervention group; 1.5 [95% CI, 1.4-1.6] in the control group; ratio of intervention to control, 1.2 [95% CI, 1.1-1.3]).Conclusions and relevanceAlthough postdischarge nurse contact did not decrease the reutilization rate of postdischarge urgent health care services, this method shows promise to bolster postdischarge education.Trial registrationClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT02081846.

Dataset Information

Question design in nurse-led and GP-led telephone triage for same-day appointment requests: a comparative investigation.

Objective

Design

Setting

Participants

Main outcome measure

Results

Conclusions

Publications

Question design in nurse-led and GP-led telephone triage for same-day appointment requests: a comparative investigation.

Similar Datasets

OmicsDI is part of the ELIXIR infrastructure