A communication skills intervention for parents of pediatric surgery patients

It was hypothesized that parents exposed to a communication skills intervention would participate (e.g., ask questions, express concerns) in a pre-surgical consultation more than parents in the control group.

Sixty-five parents of prospective pediatric surgery patients were randomly assigned to either a communication skills intervention (booklet mailed prior to the consultation) or control group. Only initial consultation parents were included, no follow-ups. Audio-recordings of the medical consultations were obtained and the transcripts analyzed utilizing a content-coding system to determine patient participation. Also, parents were given a health literacy test (s-TOFHLA) and a post-interview questionnaire to gather demographic data.

Intervention parents participated overall significantly more than control parents. Follow-up analyses revealed that intervention parents asked significantly more questions, and engaged in significantly more information verifying and expressing of concerns. There were no significant differences for parents' assertive statements or information provision. Other significant predictors of parents' participation were consultation length and parents' income.

The intervention tested in this study promoted parents' participation in a pre-surgical consultation. As such, it has the potential to improve information exchange between parents and physicians with positive implications for informed consent.

Providing parents with communication guidelines prior to a surgical consultation may improve physician-patient communication.