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Physician and Parental Decision-Making Prior to Acute Medical Paediatric Admission.

ABSTRACT: BACKGROUND:The number of acute medical paediatric emergency admissions is rising. We undertook qualitative interviews with parents and clinicians to better understand what factors, other than the health status of the child, may influence decision making leading to emergency admission. METHODS:Semi-structured interviews were conducted with parents; clinicians working in general practice, out-of-hours or the emergency department (referring clinicians); and doctors working in acute medical paediatrics (receiving clinicians). RESULTS:Ten parents, 7 referring clinicians and 10 receiving clinicians were interviewed. Parents described "erring on the side of caution" when seeking medical opinion and one mentioned anxiety. Among themes seen among referring clinicians, "erring on the side of caution" was also identified as was managing "parental anxiety" and acting on "gut instinct". Among receiving clinicians, themes included managing parental anxiety and increasing parental expectations of the health service. CONCLUSIONS:The study of parent and referring clinician decision-making prior to a hospital admission can identify "teachable moments" where interventions might be delivered to slow or even arrest the rise in short-stay acute medical admissions in Britain and other countries. Interventions could assure parents or referring clinicians that hospital referral is not required and help clinicians understand what they perceive as "parental anxiety".

SUBMITTER: Barwise-Munro R

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6165442 | biostudies-other | 2018 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-other

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Physician and Parental Decision-Making Prior to Acute Medical Paediatric Admission.

Barwise-Munro Rebecca R Morgan Heather H Turner Steve S

Healthcare (Basel, Switzerland) 20180917 3

<h4>Background</h4>The number of acute medical paediatric emergency admissions is rising. We undertook qualitative interviews with parents and clinicians to better understand what factors, other than the health status of the child, may influence decision making leading to emergency admission.<h4>Methods</h4>Semi-structured interviews were conducted with parents; clinicians working in general practice, out-of-hours or the emergency department (referring clinicians); and doctors working in acute m ...[more]

PMID: 30227652

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Project description:Elderly patients with acute myeloid leukemia can be treated with intensive chemotherapy, low-intensity therapy such as low-dose aracytine or hypomethylating agents, or best supportive care. The choice between these treatments is a function of many patient-related and disease-related factors. We investigated how physicians' behavioral characteristics affect medical decision-making between intensive and non-intensive therapy in this setting. A nationwide cross-sectional online survey of hematologists collected data on medical decision-making for 6 clinical vignettes involving older acute myeloid leukemia patients that were representative of routine practice. Questionnaires elicited physicians' demographic and occupational characteristics along with their individual behavioral characteristics according to a decision theory framework. From the pattern of responses to the vignettes, a K-means clustering algorithm was used to distinguish those who were likely to prescribe more intensive therapy and those who were likely to prescribe less intensive or no therapy. Multivariate analyses were used to identify physician's characteristics predictive of medical decision-making. We obtained 230 assessable answers, which represented an adjusted response rate of 45.4%. A multivariate model (n=210) revealed that physicians averse to uncertainty recommend significantly more intensive chemotherapy: Odds Ratio (OR) [95% Confidence Interval (CI)]: 1.15 [1.01;1.30]; P=0.039. Male physicians who do not conform to the expected utility model (assumed as economically irrational) recommend more intensive chemotherapy [OR (95% CI) = 3.45 (1.34; 8.85); P=0.01]. Patient volume per physician also correlated with therapy intensity [OR (95% CI)=0.98 (0.96; 0.99); P=0.032]. The physicians' medical decision-making was not affected by their age, years of experience, or hospital facility. The significant association between medical decision and individual behavioral characteristics of the physician identifies a novel non-biological factor that may affect acute myeloid leukemia patients' outcomes and explain variations in clinical practice. It should also encourage the use of validated predictive models and the description of novel bio-markers to best select patients for intensive chemotherapy or low-intensity therapy.

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Project description:A growing number of parents delay vaccinations or are deciding not to vaccinate their children altogether. This increases the risk of contracting vaccine-preventable diseases and disrupting herd immunity, and also impairs the trust in the capacities of health care systems to protect people. Vaccine hesitancy is related to a range of both psychological and demographic determinants, such as attitudes toward vaccinations, social norms, and trust in science. Our aim is to understand those determinants in parents, because they are a special group in this issue-they act as proxy decision makers for their children, who are unable to decide for themselves. The fact that deciding to vaccinate is a socially forced choice that concerns a child's health makes vaccine-related decisions highly important and involving for parents. This high involvement might lead to parents overemphasizing the potential side effects that they know to be vaccine-related, and by amplifying those, parents are more focused on the potential outcomes of vaccine-related decisions, which can yield specific pattern of the outcome bias. We propose two related studies to investigate factors which promote vaccine hesitancy, protective factors that determine parental vaccination decisions, and outcome bias in parental vaccination intentions. We will explore demographic and psychological factors, and test parental involvement related to vaccine hesitancy using an online battery in a correlation panel design study. The second study is an experimental study, in which we will investigate the moderating role of parents' high involvement in the specific domain of vaccination decision making. We expect that higher involvement among parents, compared to non-parents, will shape the pattern of the proneness to outcome bias. The studies will be conducted across eight countries in Europe and Asia (Finland, Germany, Hong Kong, the Netherlands, Serbia, Slovenia, Spain, and the United Kingdom), rendering findings that will aid with understanding the underlying mechanisms of vaccine hesitancy and paving the way for developing interventions custom-made for parents.

Project description:There is only low-certainty evidence on the use of predictive models to assist COVID-19 patient's ICU admission decision-making process. Accumulative evidence suggests that lung ultrasound (LUS) assessment of COVID-19 patients allows accurate bedside evaluation of lung integrity, with the added advantage of repeatability, absence of radiation exposure, reduced risk of virus dissemination, and low cost. Our goal is to assess the performance of a quantified indicator resulting from LUS data compared with standard clinical practice model to predict critical respiratory illness in the 24 hours following hospital admission.DesignProspective cohort study.SettingCritical Care Unit from University Hospital Purpan (Toulouse, France) between July 2020 and March 2021.PatientsAdult patients for COVID-19 who were in acute respiratory failure (ARF), defined as blood oxygen saturation as measured by pulse oximetry less than 90% while breathing room air or respiratory rate greater than or equal to 30 breaths/min at hospital admission. Linear multivariate models were used to identify factors associated with critical respiratory illness, defined as death or mild/severe acute respiratory distress syndrome (Pao2/Fio2 < 200) in the 24 hours after patient's hospital admission.InterventionLUS assessment.Measurements and main resultsOne hundred and forty COVID-19 patients with ARF were studied. This cohort was split into two independent groups: learning sample (first 70 patients) and validation sample (last 70 patients). Interstitial lung water, thickening of the pleural line, and alveolar consolidation detection were strongly associated with patient's outcome. The LUS model predicted more accurately patient's outcomes than the standard clinical practice model (DeLong test: Testing: z score = 2.50, p value = 0.01; Validation: z score = 2.11, p value = 0.03).ConclusionsLUS assessment of COVID-19 patients with ARF at hospital admission allows a more accurate prediction of the risk of critical respiratory illness than standard clinical practice. These results hold the promise of improving ICU resource allocation process, particularly in the case of massive influx of patients or limited resources, both now and in future anticipated pandemics.

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Physician and Parental Decision-Making Prior to Acute Medical Paediatric Admission.

Publications

Physician and Parental Decision-Making Prior to Acute Medical Paediatric Admission.

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