People whose conditions make them more vulnerable, such as a learning disability/difficulty, dementia and/or a mental health issues the prospect of combining these visits is often extremely upsetting.
The additional challenges of not understanding and difficulties in communicating anxieties can lead to extreme heightened levels of distress with the potential of challenging behaviour that may pose a level of risk to themselves or others. Our team at Princess of Wales Hospital, Bridgend provide a specialist list for those requiring a General Anaesthetic for Restorative Dentistry. Many of our patients developed a mistrust of hospital staff through previous bad hospital experiences and we had to put this right.
With every patient being un1que we jointly develop a plan to eliminate processes that a person may find distressing and to meet those essential reasonable adjustments that make a real difference. Importantly we see and get to know the un1que person and what would make a good day.
As a result of co production and listening to our citizens we ensured they were at the heart of our iterative Plan Do Study Act cycles of Quality Improvement to design a service they needed. We also provide person choice distraction during anaesthesia for a great trip to the theatre memorable for the right reasons.
This has led to some very un1que experiences from Dr Who to disco surgery.
It has provided many personal stories of how we made our users feel and we have enjoyed every moment.
‘Themed’ Anaesthesia: The whole patient journey revolves around what the patient enjoys. One memorable day happened when the patient commented during our pre assessment ‘dress rehearsal’ the facemask was like that used by a pilot in Top Gun his favourite movie.
On his operating day he watched the movie until ready for theatre, walked to the theatre to the Top Gun theme tune, took part in the WHO theatre safety checklist as a pilot and then holding the facemask went off to sleep whilst watching a flight scene. On waking in Recovery he was presented with a Top Gun flight certificate.
‘Stealth’ Anaesthesia: The person is distracted by a magic show, Ipad games, puppets watching a movie cinema style or singing along to a karaoke tune whilst being covertly administered an inhalational or intravenous anaesthetic. This led to simple adaptations to the anaesthetic catheter mount so you can go off to sleep whilst smelling a flower. One young girl had a Disney Frozen experience whilst smelling a snowflake watching and singing along to the classic ‘let it go’ screened on a large screen within our darkened theatre with sensory lights for added effect. For more information contact [email protected] or Twitter Paul Harris@uniquespaday