Patient Satisfaction: Care Through the Patients' Eyes

Patient Experience

By: Jared Bilski

Published: 9/11/2019

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Staff at Lakeland Surgical & Diagnostic Center see satisfaction surveys as a golden opportunity to bolster every aspect of patient care.


The winner of this year's OR Excellence Award for Patient Satisfaction goes to great lengths to get patients to fill out their post-op surveys and even greater lengths to implement the suggestions those patients have.

"If we don't get feedback from our patients, how are we going to know where we need to improve?" asks Nikki Williams, RN, CNOR, the OR director at Lakeland (Fla.) Surgical & Diagnostic Center.

The facility recently started giving an extra incentive for patients to fill out the all-important survey. Inside of post-op thank you cards, Lakeland includes a note letting patients know that if they simply fill out the survey, they'll automatically be entered into a drawing to win a $50 gift card. "We saw a nice little boost right after we added the raffle," says Ms. Williams.

Of course, getting patients to respond to satisfaction surveys is only one part of the equation. You still need to receive high marks on every aspect of the care you provide. Here are some of the personal touches that make Lakeland one of this year's award-winning facilities.

PERSONAL TOUCH Pediatric procedure certificates, staff-signed "thank you' cards and handwritten notes from a director are all part of the personal touch Lakeland Surgical & Diagnostic Center gives its patients.
  • Child-friendly options. Near one end of its pre-op area, Lakeland has a designated area for children who are awaiting surgery, which works wonders for both the kids and their parents. The room has a plastic Fisher-Price table, a toy chest and some children's books. Pediatric patients are also given a soft toy, so they don't bring their own toys into the OR, and they're awarded a certificate for being brave and doing well following their procedure. Lakeland also has iPads with a Hulu subscription available (for all pediatric and adult patients) so children don't waste one of the most critical commodities for modern parents: cellular data.
  • Aromatherapy. Instead of automatically using an IV or oral antiemetic any time a patient is prone to PONV, Lakeland introduced aromatherapy in the PACU. "We'll ask the patient, "Would you like to try some aromatherapy?'" says Ms. Williams. "Then we give them a choice of different scents like lavender or peppermint or orange." Lakeland uses bottles of aromatherapy oils, and dips the oils onto cotton balls, which are kept in a little cloth bag that's pinned to the patient's gown. Patients can then pull up the bags to their noses and sniff the oil whenever they feel a bit nauseous.
FOR THE KIDS Lakeside's designated children's area is designed specifically to keep kids calm and happy while they wait for surgery, but it also helps parents, as well.   |  Nikki Williams, RN, CNOR

But patients aren't the only ones who benefit from the use of aromatherapy. In the busy GI unit, there's an aromatherapy machine at the nurses' station that dispenses a calming lavender scent. The logic behind the staff-centered aromatherapy: The calmer the staff, the more satisfied the patients.

  • Personal outreach. Every facility is bound to have at least a few patients who aren't 100% satisfied with their overall experience. Lakeland targets this faction with personal outreach from high-level staff. "If we get negative feedback on a survey, a director will follow up with the patient through a hand-written card or even a direct phone call," says Ms. Williams. "A lot of patients are surprised to get a call from a director because they think "I'm filling out this survey, but it's not gonna do anything.' The phone call shows them that we do intend to do something."

The goal, of course, is to prevent negative comments in the first place. That's easier said than done — especially in those situations where impatient patients' procedures are delayed, and they're asked to wait for longer-than-expected stretches of time. Lakeland's staff is able to reduce patients' frustration simply by suggesting they watch something on the facility-provided iPads, a patient-satisfier that's mainly used for children but is available for everyone. In other cases, the staff takes a preemptive approach. When patients appear a bit antsy, Lakeland staff will approach the patient before the patient approaches them and present gift cards for local area restaurants. "We'll go up to the patient and say, "Look I'm sorry you've waited so long. Here's a gift card for you guys to have a meal on us,'" says Ms. Williams. Lakeland generally gives out around 4 or 5 gift cards per month for a variety of reasons, and Ms. Williams says it's helped to minimize any negative responses on the facility's patient surveys.

After surgery, every patient receives a hand-written card from the entire staff at Lakeland. Each department gets his or her entire staff to sign the cards, so patients will routinely get cards with signatures in the double-digits. "It's something our patients definitely appreciate," says Ms. Williams. "A large amount of our surveys include comments from patients saying how much they liked the personal touch of the thank-you cards."

If you're looking for ways to ramp up your own facility's patient satisfaction efforts, Ms. Williams can't stress the importance of the survey enough. As she puts it, the patient satisfaction survey is a proven way to "see the care you provided through the patients' eyes." And based on Lakeland's survey scores and patients' comments, the view is pretty good. OSM

HONORABLE MENTIONS
Little Things Make a Big Difference.
FOUND IT Staff at The Surgery Center race to finish a scavenger hunt using the clues displayed on a centrally located bulletin board.   |  Cindy Wiersema, RN, BSN
  • Surgical scavenger hunts. The staff at The Surgery Center in Fort Wayne, Ind., are firm believers you can't have satisfied patients without first having a satisfied staff. As a result, The Surgery Center always has a number of initiatives in play to keep their team's morale high. The staff scavenger hunt — dubbed "Medical Detectives" — is just one of the many examples. Clues are displayed on a centralized bulletin board and the first staff member to find the item that corresponds to each clue wins a prize, which varies from movie gift cards to a basket full of goodies. The effect of events like Medical Detectives perfectly encapsulates The Surgery Center's approach to patient satisfaction. As Cindy Wiersema, RN, BSN, the facility's director, puts it: "Give your employees something to smile about, and that smile will reflect onto your patients."
STICKER STAMP\ING
Children's Hospital Colorado
STICKER STAMPING Pediatric patients get their "passport" stamped with fun stickers like the Anesthesia Bear as they make their way through the surgical journey.
  • Passports for the pint-sized. Peri- operative services at Children's Hospital Colorado in Aurora recently garnered the highest patient satisfaction scores the organization has seen in the past decade thanks to creative ideas like the procedural "passport," which is an innovative approach to the surgical journey. "Patients receive a "passport' when they check in, and staff sticker and sign the passport as the patient moves from the pre-op to the post-op phase of care," says Tammy Woolley, RN, MS, MBA, CNOR, CSPM, NEA-BC, the hospital's director of perioperative services.
MORE THAN A NU\MBER
UPMC Pinnacle Hospital
MORE THAN A NUMBER By specifically asking patients what's most important to them, staff ensures patients know the OR team is focused on their individual concerns.
  • "What Matters Most.' In the world of high-volume outpatient procedures, the last thing you want is to make patients feel as though their individual needs don't matter. To ensure staff focuses on every patient's concerns and anxieties during their surgical experience, UPMC Pinnacle Hospital in Harrisburg, Pa., has implemented a "What Matters Most" program where patients are given a simple form that asks them "What is most important to you today?" (See photo). "Good quality care is a given," says Sandra Winston, MHA, MSN, RN, system vice president of surgical services for UPMC Pinnacle. "But we want to know exactly what patients expect to get out of the surgical experience." It's one way of making sure patients know they're care about as individuals, adds Ms. Winston.

— Jared Bilski

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