Effect of patient information on length of stay following total hip replacement

ISRCTN	ISRCTN16674928
DOI	https://doi.org/10.1186/ISRCTN16674928
Secondary identifying numbers	N0077155742

Submission date: 30/09/2005
Registration date: 30/09/2005
Last edited: 29/11/2011

Recruitment status: Stopped
Overall study status: Stopped
Condition category: Surgery

Prospectively registered

Protocol

Statistical analysis plan

Results

Individual participant data

Record updated in last year

Plain English summary of protocol

Not provided at time of registration

Contact information

Mr J Rowles
Scientific

Derby Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust
Department of Trauma & Orthopaedics
Derbyshire Royal Infirmary
London Road
Derby
DE1 2QY
United Kingdom

Study information

Study design	Randomised controlled trial
Primary study design	Interventional
Secondary study design	Randomised controlled trial
Study setting(s)	Hospital
Study type	Treatment
Scientific title
Study objectives	Does giving patients additional pre-operative information with regards to expected length and course of inpatient stay following total hip replacement shorten their actual length of stay?
Ethics approval(s)	Not provided at time of registration
Health condition(s) or problem(s) studied	Surgery: Hip replacement
Intervention	Patients attending pre-operative assessment for their total hip replacement will be randomised into 2 groups. They will all be given the information booklet they have always been given which includes the statement that they will be in hospital 5-10 days. All patients will be managed identically to current practice. The pre-operative assessment clinic involves the patients meeting with a nurse, surgeon and anaesthetist to establish fitness for anaesthetic and operation. The patient also undergoes a fully informed consenting procedure to ensure they understand what the operation entails and risks of complications. One subset of patients will be given some additional verbal information with regards to the details of their expected course. this will explain which days are targets for achieving sitting out of bed, mobilising with a zimmer and ultimately discharge date. The remaining patients will be managed as per current practice. Management of the patients will then be identical and also no different from current management. They will undergo surgery and the same nursing and physiotherapy care on the ward. There will be no pressure for earlier discharge as the ward staff and physiotherapists will not be aware of which group is which. Once the patients are discharged I will review their notesto document details such as age, sex, concurrent medical problems, type of prosthesis, day of surgery (if a patient is operated on Friday their discharge may be delayed as there is reduced physiotherapy over the weekend) and post-operative complications. It will be of course noted the actual length of stay. As a precaution the notes will also be reviewed 4 weeks following discharge to ensure the patients did not require readmission. I will then compare the 2 groups against one another and statistically analyse to see if there is a significant difference in length of stay between them. A qualitative picture of whether length of stay has been shortened by increasing patients information about inpatient stay will be obtained by comparison of the groups. Please note, this trial was superseded by the introduction of independent treatment centres with length of stay changing over night to a 5 day programme making this study null and void.
Intervention type	Procedure/Surgery
Primary outcome measure	Length of inpatient stay following primary total hip replacement.
Secondary outcome measures	Not provided at time of registration
Overall study start date	03/02/2005
Completion date	01/01/2007
Reason abandoned (if study stopped)	Objectives no longer viable

Eligibility

Participant type(s)	Patient
Age group	Not Specified
Sex	Not Specified
Target number of participants	500
Key inclusion criteria	All patients on the waiting list for a total hip replacement (under care of participating consultants) undergo pre-operative assessment 2-3 weeks prior to surgery. This is in order to check they are medically fit for surgery and also to make sure they understand the procedure and what to expect from the surgery. The patients will be randomised into 2 groups and colour coded on the list of patients attending that day in pre-op assessment. The nurses and doctors in the pre-operative assessment unit will them know who is in which group. There will be no documentation on the patient notes stating which group they are in. During the consultation with the doctor, half of the patients will be managed as per current practice. the other group will be verbally told additional information about their expected inpatient stay. The patients will not be able to be informed of the study as this will obviously invalidate the results by heightening their awareness of the issue of inpatient stay (that is they may go and do further research themselves, including speaking to the other patients about what they have been told).
Key exclusion criteria	Any patients undergoing revision total hip replacement.
Date of first enrolment	03/02/2005
Date of final enrolment	01/01/2007

Locations

Countries of recruitment

England
United Kingdom

Study participating centre

Derby Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust

Derby
DE1 2QY
United Kingdom

Sponsor information

Department of Health
Government

Richmond House
79 Whitehall
London
SW1A 2NL
United Kingdom

Phone	+44 (0)20 7307 2622
Email	dhmail@doh.gsi.org.uk
Website	http://www.dh.gov.uk/Home/fs/en

Funders

Funder type

Government

Derby Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust (UK), NHS R&D Support Funding

No information available

Results and Publications

Intention to publish date
Individual participant data (IPD) Intention to share	No
IPD sharing plan summary	Not provided at time of registration
Publication and dissemination plan	Not provided at time of registration
IPD sharing plan