Reduce patients’ stress with Web site service

Program helps patients stay in touch

Can a same-day surgery program offer assistance to family members who need to update family and friends on a patient’s condition? Can it be done without disrupting staff members’ jobs or costing the family members a lot of money? Will it increase patient satisfaction with your same-day surgery program?

The answer to all of these questions is yes, says Diana Torre director of surgical services at White Plains (NY) Hospital. What was her solution? VisitingOurs.com, which was developed by David Gottesfeld, PsyD, a psychologist in New York City. The program enables family members to keep friends and other family members up to date on the patient’s progress via the Internet. The idea for VisitingOurs.com came to Gottesfeld after hearing his own patients talk about the stress of having a family member in the hospital for any reason.

"Patients talked about the number of telephone calls they received or had to make and the need to repeat the same story to each person," Gottesfeld explains.

A same-day surgery program that helps patients and their family members deal with the time-consuming, stressful task of updating others gets good feedback from patients, says Torre. A computer terminal that enables patients’ family members to log on to the VisitingOurs.com Web site is in the waiting room of the same-day surgery department. "We’ve had VisitingOurs.com since early summer of 2000, and although we haven’t conducted a formal survey, the comments from patients and their family members have been positive," she says.

The advantage of VisitingOurs.com over e-mail is the ease of use, says Karen Burris-Lombardi, director of community relations at White Plains. "Even a person with no computer experience can sit at one of the terminals we provide and set up their own page on the site," she says. "The family member is walked through the process, step by step, in simple language."

White Plains offers computer terminals for convenience and also for people who might not have their own computers, says Burris-Lombardi. The computers provided in the waiting room are directly linked to Visiting Ours.com so there is no surfing the Internet or tying up the computer with personal e-mail, she adds.

There is a facility fee charged to the surgery center or hospital that wants to set up a page on the Web site with the facility’s logo and information, but there is no charge to the patient, says Gottesfeld. Fees are based on number of admissions and type of facility, he adds, but he declined to give a price range. Facilities that sign up as VisitingOurs.com providers are given an orientation to the program as well as brochures to distribute to patients.

White Plains gives patients VisitingOurs.com brochures at the preadmission visit and through physician offices, says Torre.

"While some facilities do provide computers for family members to use in the waiting rooms, it is not necessary," explains Gottesfeld. He notes that family members can access the Web site from their own computers at their homes or offices and are not limited to using the terminals provided by the facility.

To use VisitingOurs.com, a patient or family member goes to the Web site to check in. A personal identification number (PIN) is issued by the Web page, and an e-mail list of people the patient wants notified with each update can be built. The PIN is the code given to friends and family members to enable them to access the patient’s updated information on the Web site. A second PIN is issued to the patient or family member who is designated as the "guardian angel," or the person responsible for updating the patient’s information or the e-mail list.

"We are very conscious of patient confidentiality," says Gottesfeld. The PIN that is given to friends only allows them to read the information or send an e-mail back to the patient.

"The guardian angel is the only person who can change the information or control the distribution list," he explains. The e-mail list is not used to send the updated information, he says. Instead, a notification that information has been updated is e-mailed to people on the list to let them know they can use the PIN to see the new information. This prevents a patient’s confidential information from being e-mailed to computers that might be used by more than one person who might not have been authorized by the patient to see the information.

Patients’ information pages stay active for however long they need it to be, says Gottesfeld. Same-day surgery patients usually set up the page the day before they are scheduled for surgery and use it for several days following surgery, he says.

If the patient or guardian angel forgets to close the page, VisitingOurs.com will contact them if no updates have been made for three weeks. "If there is no response from the guardian angel or patient, the program automatically closes the page," adds Gottesfeld.

Since the computers or brochures describing the program are generally in the waiting rooms, operating room nurses, anesthesiologists, and physicians might not be directly involved with VisitingOurs.com, but all staff members need to be oriented to the program, says Torre.

"The orientation should explain everything the program can do, where the computers are located, and why the organization is offering the service," she says. While admissions or clerical staff members are probably asked the most questions, a patient will sometimes ask about the program when they are talking with the anesthesiologist or pre-op nurse, she adds.

It is also good to designate a specific staff member or two as the VisitingOurs.com resource people, especially when the program is first offered, Torre recommends. "The patient’s questions will get answered, but not all staff members will have to become experts if they have a resource person to call upon."

White Plains offers VisitingOurs.com as part of the facility’s customer service initiative, explains Torre. "It ties into our overall mission, and that is an important point to make as we introduce the service to both patients and staff members."

For more information about VisitingOurs.com, contact:

• David Gottesfeld, PsyD, Chief Executive Officer, VisitingOurs.com, 165 W. End Ave., New York, NY 10023. Telephone: (800) 989-8592 or (212) 362-9165. Fax: (212) 362-8168. E-mail: info@visitingours.com. Web site: www.VisitingOurs.com.