Efficacy of a paging system for parents awaiting their child's return from cardiothoracic surgery

Purpose:
Parents awaiting cardiac surgery usually experience significant anxiety and stress. The high incidence of parental emotional distress with pediatric surgery may affect their child's postoperative recovery.

Significance:
A perioperative paging system may be one way to alleviate parental anxiety, increasing satisfaction among patients and parents alike.

Strategy and Implementation:
In a quartertiary pediatric cardiothoracic ICU (CTICU), the efficacy of a family paging system was examined and evaluated after transitioning to a new hospital building. Twenty families of cardiothoracic surgery patients, post-operative day zero to five, were asked to complete a survey designed to elucidate the parent's experience with the current family paging system. In addition, through a randomized process, a family was followed through their child's surgical process. We found that 1.) 55% of families found it helpful to have the pagers while waiting to hear the results of surgery, 2.) parents preferred in-person communication rather than being notified by a pager, 3.) there is a lack of knowledge by staff on the proper use of pagers, therefore, inconsistent information is being given to families, and 4.) only 21% of the parents were notified by pager to see their child in the CTICU.

Evaluation:
Our results showed that families favored the pagers, but the paging system that we had in place in the CTICU was ineffective.

Implications for Practice:
Based on the results, we implemented standardized education regarding the pager system, and developed communication guidelines for CTICU staff.