Use of a Smartphone Application for Spine Surgery Improves Patient Adherence with Preoperative Instructions and Decreases Last-minute Surgery Cancellations

Jeffrey J Stewart; Islam Fayed; Shawnda Henault; Babak Kalantar; Jean-Marc Voyadzis

doi:10.7759/cureus.4192

Use of a Smartphone Application for Spine Surgery Improves Patient Adherence with Preoperative Instructions and Decreases Last-minute Surgery Cancellations

Cureus. 2019 Mar 6;11(3):e4192. doi: 10.7759/cureus.4192.

Authors

Jeffrey J Stewart¹, Islam Fayed², Shawnda Henault¹, Babak Kalantar³, Jean-Marc Voyadzis²

Affiliations

¹ Miscellaneous, Georgetown University School of Medicine, Washington DC, USA.
² Neurosurgery, Medstar Georgetown University Hospital, Washington DC, USA.
³ Orthopaedics, Medstar Georgetown University Hospital, Washington DC, USA.

Abstract

Background: Smartphone applications (apps) are being increasingly utilized in the health care arena to improve patient care and outcomes.

Objective: To further demonstrate the ability of a smartphone app to improve patient compliance with preoperative instructions and to decrease the number of last-minute surgery cancellations.

Methods: Patients undergoing spine surgery were prospectively accrued. Smartphone app users were compared to non-app users. Patient adherence with preoperative instructions as well as last-minute surgery cancellations were analyzed.

Results: All 85 app users adhered to preoperative instructions according to the acknowledgements sent to the web portal, and there were no cancelled surgeries. Among the 89 non-app users, there were five cancelled surgeries (5.6%).

Conclusions: We demonstrate the ability of a smartphone application to improve patient adherence with preoperative instructions and decrease last-minute surgery cancellations.

Keywords: mobile applications; patient satisfaction; perioperative care; smartphone; surgical cancellations.