EN
TÜRKÇE
Poster - 22
What information do parents and children need for their informed consent before a pediatric surgical operation and how do they get it?
Asim Zouari 1, Udo Rolle 2, Andrea Schmedding 3
1 Department of Pediatric Surgery, University Medical Center of the Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, Mainz, Germany
2 Department of Pediatric Surgery and Pediatric Urology, University Hospital Frankfurt, Goethe University Frankfurt, Frankfurt, Germany
3 Department of Pediatric Surgery, Hospital Braunschweig, Braunschweig, Germany
Purpose:
Parents of children undergoing pediatric surgery need clear information about the medical condition, procedure, and follow-up care. This information should be provided by the treating pediatric surgeon, anesthetist and general practitioners or pediatricians. This study examines what information parents and children want before surgery, where they prefer to get it, where they actually get it, and how their views change over time. Additionally, this study aims to explore the viewpoints of pediatric surgeons in Germany on this subject.
Methods:
A questionnaire was distributed to families undergoing routine pediatric surgical procedures, both before the operation and four weeks afterward. Additionally, members of the national pediatric surgical association were surveyed using a standardized questionnaire to gather their perspectives on preoperative consultations in pediatric surgery.
Results:
A total of 44 parents, 11 pediatric patients, and 135 pediatric surgeons completed the questionnaire. After the informed consent discussion, 90% of parents sought additional information online, most commonly via Google (40%), forums (24%), and Wikipedia (21%). Frequently missing topics included the postoperative course (71%), pain management (71%), and surgery duration (40%).
Among responding children, 64% desired more preoperative information, and 73% used the internet for this purpose.
Pediatric surgeons reported that the duration of preoperative information discussions was less than 5 minutes in 8% of cases, 5–10 minutes in 46%, and >10 minutes in 45%. Overall, 77% stated that they also provide information directly to children, 10% for those <6 years of age, 22% <11, and 39% <14. They acknowledged that families frequently seek additional information, for example from pediatricians (64%), books (52%), or online sources such as Wikipedia (30%).
Conclusion:
Parents and children often lack essential information about the planned surgery. Although pediatric surgeons are aware that families seek additional information, this awareness does not appear to improve the quality of consent discussions.