Authors (including presenting author) :
Lam WYC
Affiliation :
Department of Orthopaedic & Traumatology, Caritas Medical Centre
Introduction :
No visiting policy was adopted during the COVID pandemic that prevented relatives from visiting loved one in hospitals. Regular nurse-initiated telephone communication (daily in acute and every 3 days in rehabilitation settings) was carried out to keep relatives connected and update on patients’ condition.
However, the quality of the telephone communication by nurses could be improved as several complaints regarding miscommunication and communication breakdown between nurses and relatives were received in 2020 and 2021. These might be due to challenges in communication via phone as nonverbal cues were lost and the junior nurses (30% of nursing staff) were lacked of clinical experiences.
Objectives :
- To improve the effectiveness of telephone communication with patients’ relatives during COVID-19
- To raise nurses’ awareness and understanding of the importance of the communication content
- To improve relatives’ understanding of information exchanges
Methodology :
A structured guide and pre-written conversation scripts to telephone communication with relatives based on literature review and comments from senior management on three common situations were written to provide nurses guidance and referencing resources on effective talking to relatives since June 2022. Three common situations were “on admission”, “regular condition update” and “patient return from theatre after major operation.” Training for nurses on implementation of the guide was conducted.
Result & Outcome :
(1) 106 inpatient records were reviewed and most records (80%) showed nurses did phone to relatives for regular updating patients’ condition and had comprehensive documentation of the conversation including whom talked to and the content of update.
(2) Nurses were observed in 173 episodes of telephone communication that they were highly compliant (99%) with the guides when communicating with relatives.
(3) 69 responding nurses (69/82, 84%) were satisfied with the guide, averaging 4.1 out of 5. All junior nurses (<1-year experience) found themselves more confident in talking to relatives over the phone.
(4) 35 satisfaction questionnaires were received from relatives and most of them showed highly satisfied with nurses’ phone communication with a mean score of 4.3 out of 5.
(5) No complaint or feedback about miscommunication or communication breakdown from relatives was received in second half year of 2022.
Way Forward
Although the visiting restrictions are being relaxed as the COVID-19 situation is stabilizing, our nurses keep calling relatives and updating patients’ condition “on admission” and when “patient return from theatre.” The future new comers would also receive training on the use of this guide
to telephone communication with relative. This guide is certainly worth to be used and would be sustained for improving telephone communication in the future.
