Experiences of a new self-report instrument for post-operative recovery in children

• OBJECTIVESAccording the United Nations, children have the right to be heard and to have their opinions respected. Since postoperative recovery is an individual and subjective experience, our aim was to develop and test an instrument that provides children, also of a younger age, with a quality recovery self-report measure after tonsil surgery.METHODSThe development of Postoperative Recovery in Children (PRiC) was influenced by Quality of Recovery-24, for use in adults. It includes 23 items covering different aspects of recovery. PRiC was developed both as a traditional text-based instrument and as a version where each item is illustrated by a photo. It was distributed to 260 children undergoing tonsillotomy or total tonsillectomy in day surgery, to be answered on post-operative days 1, 4 and 10. The children and their parents were also asked to give their opinion about the instrument. The free-text answers were categorised to reflect the content and presentation of the two instrument versions.RESULTSIn the photo version, 27% of the children marked the answers on the instrument themselves, compared to 19% in the text version (n.s.). Parents of 64% of the children in the photo group reported that their child participated in answering the questions to a very high degree, compared to 58% in the text group (n.s.).  Some parents described that their children were very proud to fill in the instrument and return them by mail.The questions were mainly described as easy to understand and respond to, especially when illustrated with a photo. Some parents highlighted pain issues and asked for specific questions about what pain medication was given at home. One parent asked for the possibility to respond to the instrument online.CONCLUSIONPRiC can serve as a patient-reported outcome measure for children. PRiC can also provide parents with a tool for communicating with their child about post-operative recovery, especially when using the photo version.

Ämnesord

MEDICIN OCH HÄLSOVETENSKAP  -- Hälsovetenskap -- Omvårdnad (hsv//swe)

MEDICAL AND HEALTH SCIENCES  -- Health Sciences -- Nursing (hsv//eng)

Nyckelord

Tonsill suregery

postoperative recovery

Caring Sciences w. Medical Focus

Omvårdnadsforskning med medicinsk inriktning

Caring sciences

Omvårdnadsvetenskap

Publikations- och innehållstyp

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