Use of web-based patient education sessions on psychiatric wards

To evaluate the use of web-based patient education sessions in the psychiatric inpatient care.

The qualitative and quantitative data was collected from 93 patients' evaluation reports in two psychiatric hospitals in Finland completed by 83 nurses.

The web-education included six patient education sessions which were used over a period lasting between 1 and 70 days and took 10-360 min per patient. Out of 508 sessions, 464 had no interruptions or disturbances, 37 sessions had disturbances and seven sessions were interrupted. Three fourths of the sessions were used successfully. Factors associated with use were patients' vocational education level, mental status, diagnoses, number of nurses involved and hospital.

It is important to invest effort in web-based patient education during patients' hospitalization and to use it even with patients suffering from serious mental health disorders. This is meant to provide more alternatives in nursing.