Participatory Design and Development of a Patient-centered Toolkit to Engage Hospitalized Patients and Care Partners in their Plan of Care

Abstract

Acute care hospitals have been long recognized as complex, dynamic, and fast - paced environments characterized by suboptimal communication. Providing tools to support communication, patient activation , and engagement can improve patient outcomes and lower healthcare costs. Engaging patients in their recovery plan and providing them with information they need to be informed participants in that plan are key strategies for preventing adverse event s and error s . The aim of this project is to develop and pilot t est a web - based patient centered toolkit (PCTK) prototype to improve access to health information and to engage hospitalized patients and caregivers in the plan of care. Methods . Individual and group interviews were used to identify plan of care functional and workflow requirements and user interface design enhancements.