Enhancing Residents' Warmth in Greeting Caregivers: An Inpatient Intervention to Improve Family-Centered Communication

Background: Hospitals are increasingly motivated to improve the patient and family experience and increase patient satisfaction scores. The manner by which a provider greets patients and their families sets the tone for the hospital stay. This study aimed to improve residents' greetings of caregivers in the inpatient pediatric setting to improve family-centered communication. Methods: The study was conducted from October 2017 to April 2018 at a single, urban children's hospital on a unit with patients primarily, 5 years old. The intervention consisted of posting a prominent board outside of patients' rooms that (1) listed caregivers' preferred names (e.g., Mom/Dad, first names), (2) instructed residents to greet caregivers warmly by their preferred names, and (3) identified residents for families by name and photograph. During implementation, we conducted 5 Plan-Do-Study-Act cycles and surveyed 114 caregivers. Improvement was assessed using run charts. Results: The primary outcome was the percentage of caregivers who rated residents' warmth of greetings as "excellent." This measure increased from a baseline median of 62.5%-84.4% with$6 consecutive postintervention points above the baseline median. Conclusion: The intervention improved caregiver-perceived quality of residents' greetings and could serve as a model for other hospitals to enhance provider-family rapport and improve communication.