Preoperative Assessment Form Updates – 2024

1. Improve – Save Your Form Button

Changed “Save Your Form to Complete Later” to “Save Your Form” and changed it from a text link to a button

Why? Patient Feedback “The button to save and return to form later does not appear as a “button” to the elderly or computer iliterate.”
Shortened wording to make it clear that they could save their form at any time.

2. Improve – Save Your Form Pages

Improved the Save Your Form confirmation page and notifications. Tell patients that they can copy / save the link, have it emailed to them, or click on it.

Why? Patient Feedback = “I’m not a computer person, when it said you could ‘save and complete later’, I was afraid of doing that because I’ve tried that before on phone forms and can never get back to them. However.. I found it did work easily”

3. Update – Intro Text

Adjusted the wording of the introduction text to improve patient expectations, the time required to complete the form and the information needed on hand. Also updated the Save Your Form wording so patients have a better understanding of how it works.

Why? Patient Feedback + Save Your Form updates

4. Increase – File Uploads

Increased the maximum number of files patients can upload to 8 and the maximum file size to 10MB

Why? Patient Feedback.

5. Update – Blood Relatives examples

Added examples of who your blood relatives are (eg. your parents, your siblings, your parent’s siblings, your grandparents, your children)

Why? Member + Patient Feedback.

6. Update – Date of Operation

Updated the description wording

Why? Patient Feedback – some patients didn’t realise they could enter the date of operation as dd/mm/yyyy if they didn’t want to use the calendar icon.

7. Update – Medications / Injections

Updated the question by adding “or any injections?” and description wording by adding “eg. medication name – amount taken – daily / weekly / when was your last dose”

Why? Member Feedback – “With the rise of the use of wt loss drugs like ozempic it might be helpful to ask specifically if patients are on any weight loss injections. Many patients have been forgetting to disclose because they don’t’ consider it to be a medication/condition”
Even though we only received one request for this change from a Standard questionnaire member, we have received requests from several Premium plan members too (who receive full customisation) for the change, so we decided to include it in our Standard questionnaire as well, as the scope and breadth of the use of these drugs seems to be growing exponentially.

8. Add – Second Email Question

Add another “Please advise your Email address” question at the end of the form. Only show the question if the patient has not left an email address on the first page of the form.

Why? Member Request. When an Anaesthetist clicks “reply” to the preoperative assessment email, the email reply-to address is the one the patient provided on the first page. A patient who doesn’t provide an email address can be difficult to get in touch with, especially if email is the Anaesthetist’s preferred method of communication. If patients miss the email question on the first page, we have now included a follow-up question asking again if they have an email address at the end of the last page. Only if they do not enter an email address on the first page will this question appear. The email address will then show at the top of the completed assessment form received by the Anaesthetist.

9. Update – .con email warning

Updated the .con email warning to say if their email address really does contain a “.con” inside it, they can disregard the message

Why? Patient Feedback – we heard from several patients that their email address contains a .con in it, but they thought they couldn’t use it because of the warning message, so we added a line saying they could disregard the message if it did actually contain a .con. (Originally, this warning was added because many patients’ email confirmations bounced because they had entered .con instead of .com)

10. Update – GORD description

Added to the description “if you are unsure of which option to choose, please select “Yes”. Then select “Other” to enter more information.”

Why? Patient Feedback – several patients requested an ‘unsure’ option for this question. However, selecting Yes will show multiple important options. Therefore, we recommend that the patient selects Yes, and chooses from the new options that appear. If none of them suit them, they can select “other” and enter their concerns in a text box.

11. Update – Other Medical Conditions

Add vascular to the description

Why? Patient Feedback – one patient left feedback “I have Peripheral Vascular Disease – my major medical condition. This has necessitated a number of surgeries. Somewhat surprised that not mentioned in the questionnaire.” > But this is asked in the “Any trouble with your heart or cardiovascular system, or have you ever been to a Cardiologist?” question.. so we added a reminder of vascular problems to the description for “Do you have any other medical conditions not already mentioned?” in case another patient misses the earlier question.

12. Update – Height error message

Added “Please use centimeters and only enter a number (no text)” to the warning message.

Why? Patient Feedback. Occasionally patients will call us saying they cannot complete their form as they are unable to get past this question. We have updated the warning message to clearly explain that they can only enter numbers in this field.

13. Add – Child Height/Weight Options

If the patient is less than 14 years old, show a warning “We understand that children’s height and weight change regularly. Please enter your child’s last known height and weight (in cm and kg).” and give the parent an option to select if it’s an estimate or old measurement, and provide details.

Why? Patient Feedback. Several parents left feedback that they started completing the form for their child only to realise they didn’t have their child’s current weight and height on hand, and their child was not with them to check. To prevent them from leaving the form, we added a warning, plus an optional checkbox and text section, for children who have estimated or guessed measurements. Our goal is to have all users, especially parents (patients or carers) with limited free time, complete the questionnaire as soon as possible to allow our Anaesthetists more time to prepare, and because the parent might not have time later. (And as a parent myself, I know nothing is more satisfying than checking something off my life / child admin to-do list!)