title: "Can we just stop and talk?" patients value verbal communication about discharge care plans.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Studies show that hospitalized patients often do not understand their postdischarge care plan. There are few studies about patients' preferences regarding the content of discharge care plans.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  To identify what patients view as essential elements of a post-hospitalization plan.
  
  
  METHODS
  Anonymous written survey distributed on the second day of admission to internal medicine wards.
  
  
  METHODS
  An academic tertiary care hospital and an academic county hospital in Seattle, Washington.
  
  
  METHODS
  Two hundred English-speaking adult inpatients ≥ 18 years or their proxies.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The majority of patients (64.5%) surveyed wanted verbal discharge instructions, with only 10.5% requesting written instructions (P < 0.0001). One hundred percent of patients valued the following discharge instructions as essential: "when you need to follow-up with [primary care provider] PCP," "warning signs to call PCP," and "medicines to continue post-hospitalization." One hundred percent of patients wanted "a lot of information about my condition" and "test results," but only 39% wanted "a lot of information about my medications" (P < 0.0001). When asked to choose the most important piece of discharge instruction related to their disease, 67.5% of patients chose "lifestyle changes." One hundred percent of patients thought that personal communication between the inpatient provider and the outpatient primary care provider was "extremely important" or "essential."
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Patients uniformly placed high value on: 1) verbal communication about discharge care plans; 2) information about lifestyle changes for improved health; and 3) personal communication between inpatient and outpatient providers.
authors.affiliation: Department of Medicine, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington 98195-6429, USA.
authors.forename: Marwa
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Shoeb
authors.forename: Susan Eva
authors.initials: SE
authors.lastname: Merel
authors.forename: Molly Blackley
authors.initials: MB
authors.lastname: Jackson
authors.forename: Bradley D
authors.initials: BD
authors.lastname: Anawalt
mesh_terms: D000046:Academic Medical Centers; D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D003142:Communication; D004522:Educational Status; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007388:Internal Medicine; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010351:Patient Discharge / Q000592:standards*; D010353:Patient Education as Topic / Q000379:methods*; D057240:Patient Preference / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D011369:Professional-Patient Relations; D062606:Tertiary Care Centers; D014861:Washington; D055815:Young Adult