One page sheets for mix-and-match education
One page sheets for mix-and-match education
Staff first see what is needed and available
Simplicity, clarity, and ability to tailor educational pieces to each patient; these were some of the goals the patient education committee at the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago set when they made the decision to revamp many of the written handouts for patients.
"We wanted a single-sheet presentation style so nurses and other clinicians can pick and choose more freely. If you have topics lumped together, as they are in many brochures and booklets, they aren't always applicable for certain patients. What we are doing is breaking down all the elements of the different topics we teach," explains Bob Reinhardt, BSN, CRRN, clinical educator and staff nurse at the Rehabilitation Institute.
Work teams appointed by the patient education committee are tackling the sheets topic by topic. Topic choices are being driven by aspects of care appropriate to patients at the rehab institute. "We look at topics by way of aspects of care going down the line from medical/nursing issues, to bowel, bladder, skin, hygiene, activities of daily living issues, community discharge planning, and sexuality," explains Reinhardt.
When assigned a topic, however, a team doesn't sit down and write the sheet. They first must determine what materials on the topic are available at the institute. After determining what is available, they interview staff who specialize in the topic area to ascertain what is needed. An exhaustive search for printed materials is then conducted at sites that include libraries, nearby hospitals, and the Internet. The criteria for purchasing from outside sources is that the materials must be free or low-cost and be written better than the institute could create in-house.
If warranted, the team writes the educational sheet, aided by a couple of committee members assigned to help with editing. "We use the public relations department to help us make the sheets readable. They help with font selection, spacing of words, and layout of the material," says Reinhardt.
Currently, medication sheets are being written. Teams assigned to the various medications found that most of the material uncovered during the research process was above a fifth-grade reading level, which makes it unsuitable for the institute's patient population.
All the medication sheets are created in the same question-and-answer format, but that isn't necessarily the style other sheets will follow. "We haven't completed enough sheets to say this is going to be the standard. We want to remain flexible enough where we can change that," says Reinhardt.
The sheets are available on the hospital's computer system, so they are easily accessible. Also, hard copies of the sheets with instructions on their use are kept on the unit. (See example of medication sheets with hard copy instructions, inserted in this issue.) If using the computer version, staff can download the material to their files and edit the copy so it is more appropriate to the needs of their patients. For example, if a patient has poor eyesight, the clinician can increase the font size of the piece.
The institute currently has three large patient education manuals: stroke, spinal cord injury, and brain injury. Because the material is in a binder, staff can pull out sections or pages that are pertinent to their patient and create individualized books.
"As we looked in different files to see what people are passing out, we found that except for a few mainstays like our spinal cord manual or stroke manual, we didn't have a lot of materials on secondary conditions related to our population. What we did have was old, or we didn't know where the original copy was, and it had been copied too many times. We decided to get a fresh start," says Reinhardt.
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