How I do it: a pediatric nurse practitioner--run postoperative otolaryngology clinic

The responsibilities of the Pediatric Nurse Practitioner at The Children's Hospital of Alabama Otolaryngology Department involve many aspects of patient care, including patient assessment, history/physicals, and family education. This is a high volume clinic with an average fifty to sixty patient visits daily. This volume has created long waiting times for scheduling appointments and overbooked clinics. The nurse practitioner postoperative clinic was created in order to address these problems. Initially the clinic consisted of bilateral myringotomy tube (BMT) and tonsillectomy/adenoidectomy (T&A) patients. A year later the decision was made to have only BMT patients seen in the clinic and T&A follow-up would involve a phone call with questionnaire one month after surgery by the nurse practitioner. The postoperative clinic has successfully achieved the goal of establishing reasonable waiting times for appointments and has helped to reduce the high volume of the regular clinics.