AB1448-HPR Patients experience with a nurse-led telephone service in an outpatient clinic
Authors: E Moholt, C.L. Olsen, S.R. Molvik, S. Arnkværn, H. Lunøe, A. Fernmo, G. Stenberg, A.-B. Aga
Journal: Annals of the Rheumatic Diseases (2018)

<h3>Background</h3> According to "EULAR recommendations for the role of the nurse in the management of chronic inflammatory arthritis"<sup>1</sup>, patients with rheumatic diseases should get access to nurse-led telephone service. Patients call if they have a flare and need an appointment with the rheumatologist, have questions regarding their disease, medical treatment, infections or side-effects. Patients experience with calling a nurse need further investigation. <h3>Objectives</h3> The objective for this study was to explore and describe the patients' experience with the nurse-led telephone service in an outpatient clinic at a rheumatology department. <h3>Methods</h3> The helpline is open 2 hours daily during the week, and served by 2–3 nurses. Patients at the outpatient-clinic between 01.10.17 and 29.12.17, were invited to answer a questionnaire about the nurse-led telephone service. The questions were about access to a nurse, if they got the help they needed, if they had confidence in the nurse's knowledge, understanding her information, if the helpline was important in their lives with a chronic disease and if the nurse-led telephone service gives comfort or makes them feel secure. They could choose between 5 different answers: not at all, to a small degree, to some degree, to a large degree or to a very large degree. It was also possible to write comments. All the answered phone calls were registered. <h3>Results</h3> The nurse-led telephone service answered mean (min–max) 30<sup>19–48</sup> phone calls every day, and in total 1875 calls during the period of 3 months. Only 29% of these patients needed and got an appointment with a rheumatologist. 341 patients answered the questionnaire. 68 commented regarding long time to wait, or a need for extended time for the telephone service. However, concerning how easy the access to a nurse on helpline was, 70% answered to a large or a very large degree, as shown in table 1. 89% answered that they to a large or a very large degree got the information or help they needed from the nurse. 90% answered that they to a large or a very large degree trusted the nurse's professional skills. The nurse spoke to them so they could to a large or a very large degree understand her according to 92% of the respondents. There was some variation in the answers about the helpline's importance in their life with a chronic disease, but 44% answered to a very large degree and only 4.7% answered not at all. 66% answered that access to a nurse on helpline provides a very large degree of security. <h3>Conclusions</h3> This study shows that calling a nurse-led telephone service is valuable for patients with a rheumatic disease. Although there can be some time to wait, almost 90% got the help they needed, understood the nurse and had confidence in the nurse's knowledge. Only 13.5% answered that nurse-led telephone service has not at all or a small degree of importance in their lives with a chronic disease. The nurse-led telephone service was important to a large or very large degree to feel secure and confident for 87% of the participants in this study. <h3>Reference</h3> [1] van Eijk-Hustings Y, et al. Ann Rheum Dis2012 <h3>Disclosure of Interest</h3> None declared