Medical Clowning and Patient Experiences in a Children's Hospital

Day Surgery

patient experience, medical clowning

A case-control study is conducted in Helsinki Children's hospital. Altogether 70 children aged 4-17 years coming for a minor operative procedure including pre-operative cannula insertion will be included. Part of the patients will be exposed to medical clowning intervention and the reference group will be treated preoperatively as routinely without clowns. Emotions, anxiety levels, pain caused by the cannula insertion of the children will be monitored during the day. A survey on the emotions and expectations of the parents will be done.

This study aims to measure experiences of children and their parents during day-surgery in hospital setting. A case-control study is conducted in Helsinki Children's hospital. Altogether 70 children aged 4-17 years coming for a minor operative procedure including pre-operative cannula insertion will be included. Part of the patients will be exposed to medical clowning intervention and the reference group will be treated preoperatively as routinely without clowns. Emotions, anxiety levels, pain caused by the cannula insertion of the children will be monitored during the day. A survey on the emotions and expectations of the parents will be done. A novel digital survey tool will be used to measure patient experiences before and after the insertion of a venous cannula needed for anaesthesia. The research questions are as follows: How does engagement with a medical clown during pre-operative cannulation impact on children and their parents' patient experience? How feasible is a novel data collection tool for measuring patient experience and the impact of an intervention on the patient experience of families?

Finland