Delphi consensus on the American Society of Anesthesiologists' physical status classification in an Asian tertiary women's hospital.

BACKGROUND: The American Society of Anesthesiologists (ASA) score is generated based on patients' clinical status. Accurate ASA classification is essential for the communication of perioperative risks and resource planning. Literature suggests that ASA classification can be automated for consistency and time-efficiency. To develop a rule-based algorithm for automated ASA classification, this study seeks to establish consensus in ASA classification for clinical conditions encountered at a tertiary women's hospital. METHODS: Thirty-seven anesthesia providers rated their agreement on a 4-point Likert scale to ASA scores assigned to items via the Delphi technique. After Round 1, the group's collective responses and individual item scores were shared with participants to improve their responses for Round 2. For each item, the percentage agreement ('agree' and 'strongly agree' responses combined), median (interquartile range/IQR), and SD were calculated. Consensus for each item was defined as a percentage agreement ≥ 70%, IQR  1.0, and SD < 1.0. RESULTS: All participants completed the study and none had missing data. The number of items that reached consensus increased from 25 (51.0%) to 37 (75.5%) in the second Delphi round, particularly for items assigned ASA scores of III and IV. Nine items, which pertained to alcohol intake, asthma, thyroid disease, limited exercise tolerance, and stable angina, did not reach consensus even after two Delphi rounds. CONCLUSIONS: Delphi consensus was attained for 37 of the 49 study items (75.5%), facilitating their incorporation into a rule-based clinical support system designed to automate the prediction of ASA classification.

PreAnaesThesia computerized health (PATCH) assessment: development and validation.

BACKGROUND: Technological advances in healthcare have enabled patients to participate in digital self-assessment, with reported benefits of enhanced healthcare efficiency and self-efficacy. This report describes the design and validation of a patient-administered preanaesthesia health assessment digital application for gathering medical history relevant to preanaesthesia assessment. Effective preoperative evaluation allows for timely optimization of medical conditions and reduces case cancellations on day of surgery. METHODS: Using an iterative mixed-methods approach of literature review, surveys and panel consensus, the study sought to develop and validate a digitized preanaesthesia health assessment questionnaire in terms of face and criterion validity. A total of 228 patients were enrolled at the preoperative evaluation clinic of a tertiary women's hospital. Inclusion criteria include: age ≥ 21 years, scheduled for same-day-admission surgery, literacy in English and willingness to use a digital device. Patient perception of the digitized application was also evaluated using the QQ10 questionnaire. Reliability of health assessment questionnaire was evaluated by comparing the percentage agreement of patient responses with nurse assessment. RESULTS: Moderate to good criterion validity was obtained in 81.1 and 83.8% of questions for the paper and digital questionnaires respectively. Of total 3626 response-pairs obtained, there were 3405 (93.4%) concordant and 221 (6.1%) discrepant response-pairs for the digital questionnaire. Discrepant response-pairs, such as ""no/yes" and "unsure/yes", constitute only 3.7% of total response-pairs. Patient acceptability of the digitized assessment was high, with QQ10 value and burden scores of 76 and 30%, respectively. CONCLUSIONS: Self-administration of digitized preanaesthesia health assessment is acceptable to patients and reliable in eliciting medical history. Further iteration should focus on improving reliability of the digital tool, adapting it for use in other languages and incorporating clinical decision tools.

Effect of PreAnaesThesia Computerized Health (PATCH) Assessment on Duration of Nurse-Patient Consultation and Patient Experience: A Pilot Trial.

Preanaesthesia health assessment is gradually transitioning from paper-based, face-to-face assessment to digitized assessment, self-administered by the patient. This transition could potentially optimize the various goals of assessment, notably facilitating the efficient collection of the patient's health information. We have previously developed and validated a tablet application (PreAnaesThesia Computerized Health assessment application or "PATCH") for patients to conduct preanaesthesia self-assessment. In a randomized controlled trial, we sought to compare the duration of nurse-patient consultation and patient satisfaction between patients who underwent PATCH self-assessment vs. standard care nurse-led assessment. Fifty-two elective surgical patients were randomized to complete either PATCH assessment or standard care nurse-led assessment at an outpatient preoperative clinic. The duration of nurse-patient consultation was subsequently noted for all patients who also completed a satisfaction survey. The mean (SD) nurse-patient consultation times in the PATCH and standard care groups were comparable, at 11.5 (3.6) min and 12.2 (2.9) min, respectively (p = 0.703). Overall satisfaction scores were also comparable, at 23.9 and 27.0 respectively (p = 0.451) for the PATCH and standard nurse assessment groups. Favorable perceptions of PATCH among users ranged between 41.7% and 79.2%. In conclusion, PATCH self-assessment can feasibly be introduced into current practice with comparable nurse-patient consultation times and patient satisfaction.

Evaluation of association factors for labor episodic pain during epidural analgesia.

PURPOSE: Epidural analgesia provides safe and effective labor pain relief. However, labor episodic pain can occur during epidural analgesia, requiring epidural top-ups, and may result in decreased patient satisfaction. The primary aim of our study was to investigate the factors associated with labor episodic pain during epidural analgesia. PATIENTS AND METHODS: Electronic and hardcopy records of labor deliveries between January 2012 and December 2015 were reviewed at KK Women's and Children's Hospital, Singapore. The primary outcome was the prevalence of episodic pain. Demographic, clinical and anesthetic data were retrieved. Univariate and multivariate logistic regression analyses were used to identify associated risk factors for labor episodic pain experienced by parturients while receiving epidural analgesia. Model performance was assessed by area under the curve (AUC) from the receiver operating characteristic curve. RESULTS: The prevalence of labor episodic pain was 14.2% (2,951 of 20,798 parturients). The risk factors associated with labor episodic pain, which are given here as factor (OR, 95% CI), are the following: need for epidural resiting (11.4, 7.53-17.28), higher pain scores intrapartum (1.34, 1.32-1.36), higher Bromage scores (1.12, 1.02-1.22), the need for instrumental delivery (1.32, 1.16-1.52), the need for cesarean delivery (1.41, 1.26-1.59), the presence of venous puncture (1.29, 1.03-1.62), the presence of dural puncture (14.28, 5.92-34.43), the presence of high block (6.05, 1.39-26.35), the need for a urinary catheter (1.17, 1.17-1.34), larger volumes of local anesthetics used (1.01, 1.01-1.01) and higher body mass index (1.01, 1.01-1.02), and decreased maternal satisfaction (0.97, 0.97-0.98). The AUC was 0.80. CONCLUSION: Knowledge of these factors may allow for future interventions in management to prevent labor episodic pain. Further research is needed to validate these association factors.