Developing the Storyline for an Advance Care Planning Video for Surgery Patients: Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Engagement from Stakeholder Summit to State Fair.

BACKGROUND

Patient-centered outcomes research (PCOR) methods and social learning theory (SLT) require intensive interaction between researchers and stakeholders. Advance care planning (ACP) is valuable before major surgery, but a systematic review found no extant perioperative ACP tools. Consequently, PCOR methods and SLT can inform the development of an ACP educational video for patients and families preparing for major surgery.

OBJECTIVE

The objective is to develop and test acceptability of an ACP video storyline.

DESIGN

The design is a stakeholder-guided development of the ACP video storyline. Design-thinking methods explored and prioritized stakeholder perspectives. Patients and family members evaluated storyboards containing the proposed storyline.

SETTING/SUBJECTS: The study was conducted at hospital outpatient surgical clinics, in-person stakeholder summit, and the 2014 Maryland State Fair.

MEASUREMENTS: Measurements are done through stakeholder engagement and deidentified survey.

RESULTS

Stakeholders evaluated and prioritized evidence from an environmental scan. A surgeon, family member, and palliative care physician team iteratively developed a script featuring 12 core themes and worked with a medical graphic designer to translate the script into storyboards. For 10 days, 359 attendees of the 2014 Maryland State Fair evaluated the storyboards and 87% noted that they would be "very comfortable" or "comfortable" seeing the storyboard before major surgery, 89% considered the storyboards "very helpful" or "helpful," and 89% would "definitely recommend" or "recommend" this story to others preparing for major surgery.

CONCLUSIONS

Through an iterative process utilizing diverse PCOR engagement methods and informed by SLT, storyboards were developed for an ACP video. Field testing revealed the storyline to be highly meaningful for surgery patients and family members.