Study finds Children's Hospital patient safety program improves caregiver/family comm...( Condition Help a patient safety prog...),Health

Condition Help, a patient safety program launched more than two years ago at Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh of UPMC, has significantly improved communication between caregivers and patients and improved patient and family satisfaction, a review of the program has found.

Children's Hospital became the first pediatric hospital in the nation working with the Josie King Foundation to launch a patient safety initiative that gives parents round-the-clock access to medical intervention. Condition Help gives patients and/or parents of patients the ability to call a hotline phone number to have their child evaluated by a special medical team if they feel their child's immediate health is in danger or their concerns aren't being addressed. Family advisors served on the steering committee at Children's that established Condition Help.

A review of the first 42 Condition Help calls at Children's occurring between September 2005 and August 2007 found that the root cause of all the calls was a communication breakdown between patient and/or parent and the caregiver (physician or nurse), according to Bonnie S. Dean, PhD, RN, director of Nursing Education, Research and Professional Development at Children's and senior author of the review.

Results are published in the May/June issue of the Journal for Healthcare Quality, the official journal of the National Association for Healthcare Quality.

"The goal of this program has been to empower families because no one knows a child better than his or her parents. Our review found that Condition Help has enhanced patient safety at Children's by providing yet another safeguard against mistakes, and that it has improved the health care environment for patients, families and clinicians," Dr. Dean said. "It has dramatically helped us improve communication with patients and families, and this is critical to reducing errors."

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