title: Postoperative information transfer: a study comparing two university hospitals.
abstract: Several studies have addressed the processing of anesthetic information by paper anesthetic data records or by the electronic storage and transfer of anesthetic data. Our purpose was to analyze the oral transfer of information in the postoperative period. We investigated 198 post-operative transfer situations with 120 patients in a U.S. hospital to compare the results with those of a former study in a German hospital. A great number of parameters were used in both hospitals, but there were remarkable differences. In the U.S. hospital numeric values of current vital functions, including oxygen saturation, were more common during information transfer, whereas in the German hospital the emphasis was on case history and chronic health status. The data from the U.S. hospital and those of the German hospital show that in spite of complete anesthetic records, a short (112.3 +/- 104 sec in the U.S. and 94.1 +/- 83.6 sec in Germany) oral information transfer is inevitable when the patient is transferred from the OR to the recovery room, and from the recovery room to the ward (122.7 +/- 61.4 sec in the U.S. and and 88.0 +/- 73.0 in Germany). Software developers of patient data management systems could learn from this study that in some situations it is necessary and possible to create a small set of data which will reflect the patients status quite well.
authors: Department of Anesthesiology, Ulm University Hospital, Germany.
authors: B
authors: B
authors: Schwilk
authors: N
authors: N
authors: Gravenstein
authors: S
authors: S
authors: Blessing
authors: W
authors: W
authors: Friesdorf
mesh_terms: D000776:Anesthesiology / Q000379:methods* / Q000458:organization & administration; D003142:Communication; D005858:Germany; D006785:Hospitals, University; D006801:Humans; D008499:Medical Records; D016347:Medical Records Systems, Computerized; D010360:Patient Transfer; D011182:Postoperative Care; D014481:United States