Interrupted Care

Internal Medicine Residents’ Perceptions of Virtual Morning Report: a Multicenter Survey

“…This coincides with prior studies that describe how interruptions and distractions during educational conferences, many of which turn out to be non-urgent or unnecessary, significantly impact educational outcomes. 29 – 31 However, despite these distractions, a greater proportion of residents in our study felt that participating from the team room enhanced the learning environment, rather than detracting from it (37 vs. 25%, respectively). Free-text responses reveal how residents appreciated being able to attend to time-sensitive clinical obligations while listening to virtual MR in their team room, in contrast to leaving the room during in-person MR.…”

Resident Workload, Pager Communications, and Quality of Care

“…Our data showed peak message frequencies occurring after morning and afternoon rounds, as handoffs of care between residents generate new requests and orders. Furthermore, interns received a higher proportion of their pages on on‐call days as compared to non‐call days than was shown in previous studies [6, 8]. This implies that while work restrictions result in more hours of rest, on‐call interns are left to shoulder an increasing amount of work, as their co‐residents must leave the hospital earlier to remain in compliance with regulations.…”

Paging Frequency for Internal Medicine Residents in a Tertiary Care Hospital: A Prospective Observational Mixed Methods Study

“…Such interruptions have been shown to increase cognitive load, contribute to inefficiencies in patient care, and heighten the risk of medical errors. 8 , 9 Previous studies have reported that only 5–30% of pages are appropriate or require an immediate response. 7 , 10 , 11 Many interruptions could instead be managed through less intrusive systems, such as text-based communication or deferred task lists for the daytime, which may allow providers to prioritize urgent issues and minimize unnecessary disruptions.…”