Effect of work instruction for bronchoscopy appointment on the rate of missing or delay in

Abstract

In 2007 , missing and delays in appointment rate in patients undergoing bronchoscopy was high as 6.32%. Therefore, we had a conference among the bronchoscopy team to review in the causes of events every month. Then, our work instruction was adapted to improve the appointment,  included full explanation of the procedure, patients’ preparation, and complications and planning in 2008 with continuing evaluation, the appointment via online system database was added in our work instruction. In addition, the patient education document about bronchoscopy was made and was available to print out at the outpatient department.This retrospective study was conducted to compare the rates of missing or delays in appointment between before and after adaptation of the work instruction from 2008 to 2012.Out of 502 procedures, missing and delays in appointment occurred in 21 procedures (4.18%) in 2008. Although the number of bronchoscopic procedure in our institute increased year by year, the missing and delays in appointment decreased after starting work instruction for bronchoscopy appointment. The events went down to 2.01%, 1.62%, and 1.12% in 2009, 2010, 2011, and 2012, respectively. Continuing evaluation and improving the work instruction for bronchoscopy appointment can reduce the rate of missing and delays in appointment.