I've been working on a new series of outreach calls to patients that have just undergone Total Joint Surgery. While this procedure is fairly straightforward and patients have a high rate of total recovery, some patients find it confusing to get the important information they need post-surgery.
To learn more about the problems these patients face - I interviewed them. Lots of them. I learned a great deal about the many different experiences people have when home recovering: whether it be that they stayed in an inpatient setting to get quality care, or they rested at home and got back to work as quickly as possible. Some patients had life altering complications that were unavoidable, and others healed quickly and felt better than before. These diverse experiences will inform the way I provide information on these calls, and know better what problems to identify that patients might be having early on.
All of this information will be reported back to patients' doctors and care teams to take action on immediately if needed. I've interviewed clinicians and therapists about what types of information are important to know early on.
I'm excited to dig deeper into the research for this project, and develop an outreach call that significantly improves the access to information for patients that receive it. I hope to reduce patient anxiety and confusion during recovery, and lead them to get back to their healthy lives.