PSYCH: A Mnemonic to Help Psychiatric Residents Decrease Patient Handoff Communication Errors

The substantial adverse impact of miscommunication during transitions in care has highlighted the importance of teaching proper patient handoff practices. Although handoff standardization has been suggested, a universal system has been difficult to adopt, given the unique characteristics of the different fields of medicine. A form of standardization that has emerged is a discipline-specific handoff mnemonic: a memory aid that can serve to assist a provider in communicating pertinent information to the succeeding treatment team. A pilot study was conducted in which psychiatry residents were taught a mnemonic to use during their post-call patient handoffs.

The PSYCH mnemonic was introduced as a guide to help residents identify key information needed in a psychiatric emergency room handoff: Patient information/ background, S ituation leading to the hospital visit, Y our assessment, Critical information, and Hindrance to discharge. Resident post-call patient handoffs were voice recorded and transcribed for 12 weeks. The transcriptions were divided into three time periods: Time 1 (baseline resident handoff performance), Time 2 (natural progression in resident hand-off performance with experience), and Time 3 (resident handoff performance after training in use of the PSYCH mnemonic).

There was a statistically significant decrease in the mean number of omissions after the intervention (p = 0.049). The decrease in time spent on handoffs after the intervention was not statistically significant. On the basis of a rating scale ranging from 1 (not clear) to 4 (very clear), the residents' rating of their clarity of expectations increased from a mean of 2.79 to 3.83, and their confidence rating increased from a mean of 2.57 to 3.42.

The mnemonic helped decrease the residents' handoff omissions. It also helped improve their efficiency, clarity of expectation, and confidence during handoffs.