1 8 • O U T PA T I E N T S U R G E R Y M A G A Z I N E • N O V E M B E R 2 0 1 8
Ideas Work
That
ANXIETY SCALE
Are Your Patients Feeling or ?
Y
ou ask
patients
about their
pain levels. You ask
them for intimate
details about their
health history. And
yet you might not
ask them the most
basic of questions:
How anxious are
you right now? After
one of our cataract
patients complained
that we didn't do
enough to calm her
nerves before sur-
gery, we came up
with the patient anx-
iety scale, which lets
patients communi-
cate their stress
level by pointing to the emoji and phrase that best represents how
they're feeling. It's an icebreaker that gets patients talking about their
feelings and their feedback lets us tailor our soothing approach.
Patients who score 6 or higher receive extra attention and com-
forting measures. Staff also right-size the dose of the relaxant
• CHECKING IN Coleen Berens, RN, explains the anxiety chart to a patient at the
Kaiser Permanente Lone Tree Medical Offices in Lone Tree, Colo.
Kaiser
Permanente
Ambulatory
Surgery
Centers
