Which factors influence the approach to shared decision-making among surgeons performing complex operations?

BACKGROUND: Shared decision-making (SDM) aims to create a context in which patients and surgeons work together to explore treatment options and goals of care. The objective of the current study was to characterize demographic factors, behaviors, and perceptions of patient involvement among surgeons relative to SDM. METHODS: Using a cross-sectional survey methodology, surgeon demographics, behaviors, and perceptions of patient involvement were assessed. Surgeon approaches to SDM were measured using a 100-point scale ranging from 'patient-led' (0) to 'surgeon-led' (100). RESULTS: Among 241 respondents, most were male (n = 123, 67.2%) and White (n = 124, 69.3%); roughly one-half of surgeons had been in practice ≥10 years (n = 120, 52.4%). Surgeon approaches to SDM ranged from 0 to 81.0, with a median rating of 50.0 (IQR: 35.5, 62.0). Reported approaches to SDM were associated with years in practice, sharing information, and perceptions of patient involvement. Surgeons in practice 10 + years most frequently utilized a 'Shared, Patient-led' approach to SDM (27.5%), while individuals with less experience more often employed a 'Shared, Surgeon-led' approach (33.3%, p = 0.031). Surgeons with a 'Patient-led' approach perceived patient involvement as most important (M = 3.82, SD = 0.16), while respondents who had a 'Surgeon-led' approach considered this less important (M = 3.57, SD = 0.38; p < 0.001). CONCLUSION: Surgeon factors including demographics, behaviors, and perceptions of patient involvement influenced SDM approaches. SDM between patients and surgeons should strive to be more dynamic and tailored to each specific patient's needs to promote optimal patient-centered care.

Gaps in Patient-Centered Decision-Making Related to Complex Surgery: A Mixed-Methods Study.

INTRODUCTION: We sought to understand the perceptions of surgeons around patient preferred roles in decision-making and their approaches to patient-centered decision-making (PCDM). METHODS: A concurrent embedded mixed-methods design was utilized among a cohort of surgeons performing complex surgical procedures. Data were collected through online surveys. Associations between perceptions and PCDM approaches were examined. RESULTS: Among 241 participants, most respondents were male (67.2%) with an average age of 47.6 y (standard deviation = 10.3); roughly half (52.4%) had practiced medicine for 10 or more years. Surgeons most frequently agreed (94.2%) with the statement, "Patients prefer to make health decisions on their own after seriously considering their physician's opinion." Conversely, surgeons most frequently disagreed (73.0%) with the statement, "Patients prefer that their physician make health decisions for them." Nearly one-third (30.4%) of surgeon qualitative responses (n = 115) indicated that clinical/biological information would help them tailor their approach to PCDM. Only 12.2% of respondents indicated that they assess patient preferences regarding both decision-making and information needs. CONCLUSIONS: Surgeons most frequently agree that patients want to make their own health decisions after seriously considering their physicians opinion. A greater focus on what information surgeons should know before treatment decision-making may help optimize patient experience and outcomes related to complex surgical procedures.

The Role of Palliative Care in Heart Failure, Part 2: Characteristics of Patients Undergoing Outpatient Palliative Care Evaluation for Advanced Cardiac Therapies.

Background: Characteristics of patients undergoing outpatient evaluation for advanced cardiac therapies are largely unknown. Objective: To describe demographics, baseline quality of life, and frailty of patients undergoing evaluation for advanced therapies at the time of presentation for evaluation in an outpatient cardiac palliative care clinic and examine key quality of life differences across patients. Design: Retrospective chart review to report baseline demographics and quality of life. Settings/Subjects: Patients at a large academic medical center in the United States referred for advanced cardiac therapies in 2021. Measurements: Depression and anxiety were measured using the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale; quality of life was measured using the Functional Assessment of Chronic Illness Therapy-Palliative care (FACIT-Pal) tool; and frailty was measured using the Fried Frailty Phenotype. Differences in quality of life by disease etiology, demographic characteristics, and frailty were assessed. Results: Fifty-four patients were seen in the outpatient cardiac palliative care clinic for advanced therapy evaluation. Most were Caucasian (80%) and male (74%). Patients traveled an average of 61 minutes to the clinic. All but five lived in a rural, medically underserved, or health professional shortage area. Forty percent scored abnormal or borderline abnormal for anxiety; 22% scored abnormal or borderline abnormal for depression. The FACIT-Pal mean score was 129 (standard deviation 23), with emotional and functional well-being domains contributing most to poor quality of life. Seventy-one percent were frail. Patients with a nonischemic etiology had a 3.32 times higher rate of anxiety than nonischemic patients (95% confidence interval = 1.05-10.54, p = 0.041). Conclusion: As patients undergoing transplant evaluation have high levels of depression, anxiety, and frailty, interdisciplinary care teams will be needed to properly manage the needs of this complex population. These results can inform efforts to integrate palliative care into advanced cardiac therapy and improve patients' experiences.

The Role of Palliative Care in Heart Failure, Part 3: Facilitators and Barriers to Cardiac Palliative Care Clinic Development.

Background: Patients with heart failure frequently have significant disease burden and complex psychosocial needs. The integration of palliative care into the management of these patients can decrease symptom burden throughout their course of illness. Therefore, in 2009, we established a cardiac palliative care clinic colocated with heart failure providers in a large academic heart hospital. Objective: To better understand the facilitators and barriers to integrating palliative care into our heart failure management service. Design: Qualitative study using a semistructured interview guide. Setting, Subjects: Between October 2020 and January 2021, we invited all 25 primary cardiac providers at our academic medical center in the midwestern United States to participate in semistructured qualitative interviews to discuss their experiences with the cardiac palliative care clinic. Measurements: Interview transcripts were analyzed using a deductive-dominant thematic analysis approach to reveal emerging themes. Results: Providers noted that the integration of palliative care into the treatment of patients with heart failure was helped and hindered primarily by issues related to operations and communications. Operational themes about clinic proximity and the use of telehealth as well as communication themes around provider-provider communication and the understanding of palliative care were particularly salient. Conclusions: The facilitators and barriers identified have broad applicability that are independent of the etiological nature (e.g., cancer, pulmonary, neurological) of any specialty or palliative care clinic. Moreover, the strategies we used to implement improvements in our clinic may be of benefit to other practice models such as independent and embedded clinics.

The Role of Palliative Care in Heart Failure, Part 1: Referring Provider Perspectives About Opportunities in Advanced Cardiac Therapies.

Background: There are many ways that palliative care can support patients with heart failure, but the role of palliative care in supporting patients who are considering or are already using advanced cardiac therapies is less clear. Objective: To understand referring providers' perspectives about the role of palliative care in the treatment of patients with heart failure considering or using advanced cardiac therapies. Design: Qualitative study using a semistructured interview guide. Setting/Subjects: This study was conducted at an academic medical center in the United States with an integrated cardiac palliative care program. Interviews were conducted with cardiology providers, including cardiologists, cardiac surgeons, and nurse practitioners who care for patients with heart failure and who are considering or receiving advanced cardiac therapies. Measurements: Interview transcripts were analyzed deductively and inductively to reveal themes in providers' perspectives. Results: Five themes were identified about the role of palliative care when advanced therapies were considered or being used: (1) educating patients; (2) supporting goal-concordant care; (3) managing symptoms; (4) addressing psychosocial needs; and (5) managing end-of-life care. Providers suggested palliative care could be a facilitator of advanced therapies, rather than merely something to add to end-of-life care. Conclusions: Cardiology providers recognize the value of integrating palliative care across the heart failure disease trajectory to provide therapy options, support decision-making processes, and provide goal-concordant care for patients considering or receiving advanced therapies. Increasing awareness of opportunities to integrate palliative care throughout the treatment of these patients may help cardiology providers better coordinate with palliative care specialists to improve patient care.

The Role of Palliative Care in Heart Failure, Part 4: A Framework for Collaboration in Advance Care Planning.

Background: Palliative care integration into cardiology is growing, allowing primary cardiology care teams increasing opportunities to utilize palliative care to support processes such as advance care planning (ACP). Objective: The aim of the study is to understand perspectives of cardiac care team members about the involvement and impact of palliative care on ACP in heart failure. Design: A qualitative study using a semistructured interview guide was performed. Settings/Subjects: Interviews were conducted with cardiac care team members, including cardiologists, cardiac surgeons, and nurse practitioners, at a large academic medical center in the United States with an integrated cardiac palliative care team. Measurements: Deductive and inductive thematic analysis of interview transcripts enabled characterization of themes around the role of palliative care in ACP. Results: Two themes were identified with regard to providers' perspectives about ACP: (1) different levels of comfort with initiating and conducting ACP conversations and (2) different opinions about the desired role of palliative care in the ACP process. In exploring these themes, we characterized four distinct approaches to ACP with palliative care as a novel framework for planning consultation. Conclusions: The different approaches to ACP and the implications for how cardiac providers interact with the palliative care team present an important opportunity to guide ACP consultation in practice. Adoption of this framework may help cardiac providers enhance the process of care delivery and ACP in important ways that improve care for their patients.

Conflict in the EMS Workforce: An Analysis of an Open-Ended Survey Question Reveals a Complex Assemblage of Stress, Burnout, and Pandemic-Related Factors Influencing Well-Being.

Emergency Medical Services (EMS) clinicians provide patient care within a high-stakes, unpredictable, and complex work environment in which conflict is inevitable. Our objective was to explore the extent to which added stressors of the pandemic exacerbated EMS workplace conflict. We administered our survey to a sample of U.S. nationally certified EMS clinicians during the COVID-19 pandemic in April 2022. Out of 1881 respondents, 46% (n = 857) experienced conflict and 79% (n = 674) provided free-text descriptions of their experience. The responses were analyzed for themes using qualitative content analysis, and they were then sorted into codes using word unit sets. Code counts, frequencies, and rankings were tabulated, enabling quantitative comparisons of the codes. Of the fifteen codes to emerge, stress (a precursor of burnout) and burnout-related fatigue were the key factors contributing to EMS workplace conflict. We mapped our codes to a conceptual model guided by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM) report on using a systems approach to address clinician burnout and professional well-being to explore implications for addressing conflict within that framework. Factors attributed to conflict mapped to all levels of the NASEM model, lending empirical legitimacy to a broad systems approach to fostering worker well-being. Our findings lead us to propose that active surveillance (enhanced management information and feedback systems) of frontline clinicians' experiences during public health emergencies could increase the effectiveness of regulations and policies across the healthcare system. Ideally, the contributions of the occupational health discipline would become a mainstay of a sustained response to promote ongoing worker well-being. The maintenance of a robust EMS workforce, and by extension the health professionals in its operational sphere, is unquestionably essential to our preparedness for the likelihood that pandemic threats may become more commonplace.

Prevalence of Violence against Providers in Heart and Lung Transplant Programs.

Workplace violence in healthcare institutions is becoming more frequent. The objective of this study was to better understand the nature of threat and physical acts of violence from heart and lung transplant patients and families toward healthcare providers and suggest programmatic mitigation strategies. We administered a brief survey to attendees at the 2022 International Society of Heart and Lung Transplantation Conference in Boston, Massachusetts. A total of 108 participants responded. Threats of physical violence were reported by forty-five participants (42%), were more frequently reported by nurses and advanced practice providers than physicians (67% and 75% vs. 34%; p < 0.001) and were more prevalent in the United States than abroad (49% vs. 21%; p = 0.026). Acts of physical violence were reported by one out of every eight providers. Violence against providers in transplant programs warrants closer review by health systems in order to ensure the safety of team members.

Perceptions of Treatment Burden Among Caregivers of Elders With Diabetes and Co-morbid Alzheimer's Disease and Related Dementias: A Qualitative Study.

Many older adults with diabetes (DM) have co-occurring Alzheimer's Disease (AD) and AD-Related Dementias (ADRD). Complex treatment plans may impose treatment burden for caregivers responsible for day-to-day self-management. The purpose of this qualitative study was to describe caregiver perceptions of treatment burden for people with DM-AD/ADRD. Caregivers (n = 33) of patients with DM-AD/ADRD participated in semi-structured interviews about their caregiver role and perceptions of treatment burden of DM-AD/ADRD management. Qualitative data were analyzed using content analysis (ATLAS.ti). Caregivers reported high levels of burden related to complex treatment/self-management for patients with DM-AD/ADRD that varied day-to-day with the patient's cognitive status. Four themes were: (1) trajectory of treatment burden; (2) navigating multiple healthcare providers/systems of care; (3) caregiver role conflict; and (4) emotional burden. Interventions to reduce caregiver treatment burden should include activating supportive services, education, and care coordination especially, if patient treatment increases in complexity over time.

E-Learning for Population Health Management: An Educational Innovation to Prepare Student and Practicing Nurses for Value-Based Care.

ABSTRACT: To educate nursing students and practicing registered nurses about population health management (PHM), a team of faculty and PHM clinical leaders created an innovative, scalable, turnkey ready, multimedia e-learning module. The module has four lessons; takes approximately three hours to complete; and can be accessed using a weblink from computers, smart phones, and tablets. The module engages learners with videos, flashcards, case studies, and a variety of interactive knowledge checks. Each learner can obtain a record of completion, which can be shared with faculty. Faculty implemented the module with 48 senior prelicensure nursing students who reported improved self-efficacy in PHM.

An integrative review: Women's psychosocial vulnerability in relation to paid work after a breast cancer diagnosis.

AIM: The aim of this integrative review was to explore psychosocial vulnerabilities in women after a breast cancer diagnosis that are related to their paid work. DESIGN: The review methodology was guided by Whittemore and Knafl. The Mehnert Cancer Survivorship and Work Model provided a lens through which to view vulnerability in working women with a focus on facilitating interventions to improve both recovery and work outcomes. DATA SOURCES: PUBMED, CINAHL, Web of Science, and PsycNET databases were searched for English language papers published between January 2014-June 2020. REVIEW METHODS: Titles and abstracts were screened. Inclusion/exclusion criteria were then applied to full text screen of the remaining articles following PRISMA guidelines. Thirteen studies meeting the inclusion criteria were critically appraised using the Critical Appraisal Skills Programme (CASP) checklist. A constant comparison approach was used to systematically distil findings into categories and assess their fit within the Mehnert Model subdomains. RESULTS: Vulnerabilities coalesced predominantly within the following subdomains: (a) changes in identity and role functioning; (b) social reintegration; (c) coping strategies; and (d) social supports. Patterns and themes within these subdomains were related both positively and negatively to form the contours of a survivor's satisfaction/dissatisfaction with quality of life related to work and breast cancer recovery. CONCLUSION: Overall, findings highlight the importance of employment and work environments in bolstering women's psychosocial health after a breast cancer diagnosis. IMPACT: Findings from this review support adapting psychosocial distress screening to include vulnerabilities relating to work life. Nurses are ideally positioned to facilitate this screening and engage clinicians in a dialogue surrounding patient's support needs due to nursing's central role on the interdisciplinary team. Nurses may also foster collective accountability for implementing ongoing multidisciplinary survivorship care plans that include a return to work component.

Participating in a Multisite Study Exploring Operational Failures Encountered by Frontline Nurses: Lessons Learned.

This article describes our experience participating in a multisite collaborative study involving frontline nurses and operational failures (OFs). We encountered a range of challenges conducting the study as proposed by the study's coordinating center (CC), which hindered our ability to meet our goals and objectives. We identified 3 general areas in which our expectations and actual experience diverged: 1) research resources, design, and methods; 2) CC communications and deliverables; and 3) influencing organizational change. Nurse executives considering collaborative research or assessing methods to engage clinical nurses in organizational improvements will benefit from our experience.