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O U T P A T I E N T S U R G E R Y M A G A Z I N E O N L I N E | S E P T E M B E R 2 0 1 5
12 Post-op Warning Signs for Patients
These are the symptoms that warrant a phone call to the surgeon.
T
o call or not to
call? Discharged
patients may be
either extremely reluctant
or far too eager to reach
out to their surgeons once
they're home and experi-
encing real or perceived
post-operative symptoms. How helpful would it be if they knew
exactly which developments warranted further communication, and
which didn't?
At our facility, what began as an adjunct to a practice bundle
designed to reduce colon surgical site infections has evolved into an
easy-to-understand patient teaching tool that helps us achieve that
goal.
One of our initial concerns for the bundle was that we wanted it to
be evidence-based. While researching literature to find specific needs
and strategies for post-operative patient teaching and post-discharge
follow-up, I came across a thought-provoking study in the Journal of
the American College of Surgeons (osmag.net/VTygZ8). By using a
method called the Delphi technique, in which a panel of experts estab-
lishes a consensus, a group of 11 experts had developed an early-
warning system to prevent readmissions after colorectal surgery.
Consensus was defined as having been reached when at least 70% of
the experts rated a symptom as 4 or 5 on a 5-point Likert scale (rang-
ing from 1, meaning "strongly disagree," to 5, meaning "strongly
agree"). The experts identified 10 symptoms that indicate to patients
that they should call their physicians and 2 additional symptoms that
I N F E C T I O N P R E V E N T I O N
Pegi Wasserman, BSN, RN
z HOT TIP A temperature above 101.5°F
is one of the warning signs patients
should know about.
