Triage and patient satisfaction among callers in Swedish computer-supported telephone advice nursing

Abstract

SummaryWe investigated satisfaction with a Swedish telenursing service, and the healthcare seeking behaviour among callers who received a less urgent level of healthcare than they expected. A postal questionnaire was sent to a random selection of callers (n=273) to Swedish Healthcare Direct in October 2008. The "cases" were 18 callers where the telenurse recommended a lower level of health care than the caller expected and who were not in complete agreement with the nurse. The "controls" were 22 callers who either received a lower recommendation, or were in disagreement with the recommendation. There were no differences between cases, controls and other callers regarding background factors or the telenurse classification of emergency. However, both cases and controls considered their need for health care as more urgent than the other callers. An independent test of the nurses' reception, ability to listen and to take notice of the callers' health problem, showed that nurses who had served cases, had received a significantly lower rating than other nurses. For nurses who had served controls, there was no such difference in rating. Cases and controls had fewer subsequent care visits than other callers, in the three days following the call, although the proportion of emergency visits was higher among cases and controls compared to other callers. If the caller and the nurse disagree about the nurse's recommendations, the consequence can be a dissatisfied caller and more visits to unnecessary high levels of health care. Further training of the nurses may improve the telenurse service.

Telephone nurses' communication and response to callers' concern—a mixed methods study

“…In a previous study (Rahmqvist et al, 2011), which investigated satisfaction and care-seeking behaviour among callers to this SHD site, a postal questionnaire was sent to a random selection of callers (n=273). Based on this randomized sample a group of callers (n=40) who had received a less urgent level of care than they had expected and/or was not in agreement with the telephone nurses regarding the recommended level were identified, e.g.…”

Influence of self‐care advice on patient satisfaction and healthcare utilization

“…The questionnaire was developed from an existing evaluation of patient satisfaction among callers to the SHD (Rahmqvist et al . ) and a modified version of the Quality from the Patient Perspective (QPP) questionnaire for telephone nursing (http://www.improveit.se). Because of its similarity to already tested instruments, no pilot study was performed.…”

Instruments to assess patient satisfaction after teleconsultation and triage: a systematic review

“…Eight publications described patient satisfaction after the consultation provided by the teleconsultation centers 17,19,25,26,39,42–44. Other settings include: the management of same-day appointments;6 the provision of teleconsultation services by physicians outside of specialized telemedicine institutions;19,23,45,46 maritime telemedicine;30 prison medicine;24 and teledermatology services 23.…”

“…The timing of instrument administration varied considerably across the studies. In addition, 16 publications (52%) reported the distribution of the questionnaires within 7 days of the consultation,6,19–24,27,32–34,36,37,40–42 seven studies (23%) between 14–28 days,17,18,26,28,38,39,44 and one publication (3%) reported a latency of 4–16 months 30. Also, seven (23%) studies did not report on the timing of the instrument’s administration (Table 1).…”