Development and Monitoring the Key Performance Indicators of the Quality of Care for Patients with Cleft Lips/Palates at Srinagarind Hospital.

BACKGROUND: Congenital deformities, such as cleft lips and/or cleft palates (CLP), have high incidences in the Northeast of Thailand. These birth defects can affect patient's quality of life. CLP patients need crucial and long-term treatments by a multidisciplinary team starting from prenatal stage to late adulthood. Patients and their families should involve in their own care, and their care objectives should correspond with healthcare providers. Besides the clinical outcome of interdisciplinary team, key performance indicators (KPIs) need to be developed in the hospital service unit in order to improve quality of care and treatment outcomes. OBJECTIVE: 1) to establish KPIs in hospital service units, and 2) to develop the information system to collect, analysis and improve the quality of CLP care. MATERIAL AND METHOD: A nurse coordinator was appointed in the Tawanchai Center to coordinate care. The three periods were conducted for the nurse coordinator to work with nine service units in Srinagarind Hospital for consensus on both qualitative and quantitative data to be used as service unit quality measurement. RESULTS: Thirty one KPIs from nine service units were established, collected and analyzed during a four-month period in 2014. The 20 KPIs achieved the unit targets. Two PKIs of the rates of complication with anesthesia during/after surgery in the first 24 hours and the rates of patient/caregiver's satisfaction in acquiring information from the officer were improving. There were 11 KPIs that did not achieve the targets. The coordinator nurse of the Tawanchai Center discussed with the service unit for the cause and how to improve the outcome. CONCLUSION: The monitoring KPIs will lead to improvement of outcome for better patient quality as well as benchmarking with other hospitals of Cleft Center. The KPIs from hospital service units with the monitoring and analysis of information by the nurse coordinator will enhance and lead to improvement of the quality of the patients and family centered care process.

Thai perspectives on pain.

This qualitative research aimed to study the meaning, the characteristics, and the dimensions of pain from a Thai point of view. It was conducted under the research project on the development of the quality of pain management for people in the hospital. The subjects were 62 patients, experiencing pain and receiving treatment in 4 hospitals in northeast Thailand. Data were analyzed through content analysis. The findings included: 1) concept from experience of pain, perceived pain as suffering physically and psychologically, 2) different characteristics between acute and chronic pain, 3) four levels of pain intensity: mild, moderate, high and severe, 4) pain effects on four dimensions: physical, psychological, behavioral and societal (family-social-economy), 5) two factors related to pain: alleviating factor and predisposing factor, and 6) pain management relies on beliefs, culture and religion i.e. good deeds in Buddhism affected six dimensions: physical, psychological, social, spiritual, treatment seeking and asking health personnel for help. The results of the present study revealed the influence of culture beliefs on the meaning of pain, pain characteristics, and the effects of pain as well as pain management in terms of cultural contexts. The findings may be implemented for the development of pain assessment and the model development of pain management more appropriately according to cultural contexts.

Nursing care system development for patients with cleft lip-palate and craniofacial deformities at Srinagarind Hospital.

BACKGROUND: A holistic nursing care system for patients with cleft lip-palate (CLP) and/or craniofacial deformities was arranged by the Nursing Department, Srinagarind Hospital, which provides tertiary nursing care. The nursing care system was developed as per system theory via participating management with action research following the Deming Cycle (PDCA) divided into 3 phases. Participants included 117 nurses from 8 divisions caring for patients with CLP and 128 parent caregivers. The research instruments included: 1) situation analysis, 2) meeting and planning and 3) self-administered questionnaire. Groups were divided according to the age, physical and mental aspects of the patients. RESULTS: 1) The nursing care system under study comprised psychosocial care, breastfeeding, counseling, providing assistance in various ways in order to respond to problems of patients/families by the multidisciplinary team. There was also follow-up to evaluate the results and in order to give patients/families longitudinal and continuing care. 2) Minor research of 4 nursing sections was initiated. 3) Nursing care standards, manuals, regulations and innovations for the organization of eight nursing sections were created and implemented. CONCLUSION: The present study on developing a nursing care system for patients with CLP helped the team to (a) understand the overall nursing care system (b) to develop the organization of nurses by conducting research and (c) to create 12 works for developing care. The latter aimed to establish or create standards, nursing manuals, caring manuals, regulations, innovations, CDs, portfolios and informative cartoons to be applied systematically and shared across and between communities. The model for nursing care for patients with CLP in tertiary hospitals was clearly demonstrated.