Effects of Discharge Planning program in Patients with Hip Replacement at Ranong Hospital

Abstract

This action research aimed to study the effectiveness of a discharge planning program for patients undergoing hip fracture surgery at Ranong Hospital, focusing on reducing postoperative complications and length of hospital stay (LOS), and to evaluate the satisfaction of the multidisciplinary team with the implementation of this program. A purposive sampling method was used to select 15 patients undergoing hip fracture surgery and 30 multidisciplinary team members, including physicians, registered nurses, nurse anesthetists, and physical therapists. The research instruments consisted of the discharge planning guidelines adapted from Siriraj Hospital, a patient data recording form, and a multidisciplinary team satisfaction questionnaire. The instruments were validated by experts for content validity and yielded a reliability coefficient of 0.85. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, including frequency, percentage, mean, and standard deviation.

The results revealed that after implementing the discharge planning program, the average length of stay for the patients was 10.13 days (S.D. = 5.20), with the majority staying between 6-10 days (40.00%). The incidence of postoperative complications, specifically pressure ulcers, was only 6.70%, while the vast majority of patients (93.30%) experienced no complications. Regarding the multidisciplinary team, 100.00% of the members adhered to the guidelines and agreed on their appropriateness. The overall satisfaction of the multidisciplinary team with the discharge planning program was at a high level (M = 4.64, S.D. = 0.38). The highest satisfaction score was given to the aspect that the guidelines facilitated systematic and step-by-step patient care (M = 4.74). In conclusion, the implementation of the discharge planning program for hip fracture patients at Ranong Hospital effectively standardized patient care, controlled the length of hospital stay, reduced complications, and was well-accepted by healthcare providers. Therefore, these guidelines should be continuously utilized in the department, and future research should focus on monitoring long-term health outcomes in the community.