Three Sides to Every Story: Preparing Patient and Family Storytellers, Facilitators, and Audiences

There is a growing recognition that patient engagement is necessary for the cultivation of patient- and family-centered care (PFCC) in the hospital setting. Acting on the emerging understanding that hearing stories from our patients gives valuable insight about our ability to provide compassionate PFCC, we developed an educational patient experience curriculum at our acute care teaching hospital.

To understand the benefits and consequences of patient storytelling and to explore the impact of our curriculum on participants.

The curriculum was codesigned with patients to illustrate the value and meaning of PFCC to health professional audiences. We surveyed audience members at nursing orientation events and interviewed the patient storytellers who shared their stories.

Participants indicated that patient stories could serve as lessons or reminders about the dimensions of PFCC and could inspire changes to practice. Storytellers reported an immensely rewarding experience and highlighted the value of educating and connecting with participants. However, they reported that the experience could also pose emotional challenges.

Careful and considerate facilitation of storytelling sessions is crucial to the delivery of a curriculum that is beneficial to both patients and participants. Our storytelling framework offers a novel approach to engaging patients in education, and it contributes to our existing understanding of how patient engagement efforts resonate within organizations.