[Information and anesthesia: what does the patient desire?]

Abstract

Objective: The aim of the study was to assess the patient's desire for information regarding their preoperative care and to assess the anaesthetists' perception of that desire.

Study design: Questionnaire.

Methods: The question: "Would you like to be fully informed about" 13 topics of the perioperative management was asked to 106 patients at the time of the preoperative visit. Two answers were possible: Yes I want to know; No I don't want to know. 22 senior anaesthesists were also interviewed and were asked to speculate about the patients response to each item. Data were compared with those of a similar questionnaire used in different countries.

Results: One hundred patients who underwent general, orthopaedic, urologic surgery were interviewed. Patients sought information most frequently concerning: postoperative pain and postoperative recovery (88%), time for ambulation (83%), duration of anaesthesia (77%) and different methods of anaesthesia (77%). Only 63% patients desired to be informed about all possible complications of anaesthesia. Senior anaesthesists had a correct perception of patients desire for information about the 4 important items but not for the complications of anaesthesia.

Conclusion: Our study suggests that an exhaustive information about anaesthesia is not wished by every patients.