Identity cards help patients identify their doctors

Patients admitted to hospital are immediately overloaded with information from staff in A&E, to subsequent acute medical and inpatient wards. Essential details are conveyed to patients at each step, including diagnosis, management and identification of various team members involved in their care. An initial audit within our South London hospital revealed only one third of patients admitted onto a single medical ward could recall the name of a single member of their treating team, and less than 10% retained that information over 5 days. Identification (ID) cards were devised to facilitate clear transfer of information detailing the patient's treating team. These ID cards were piloted through a series of PDSA cycles on one inpatient medical ward following a consultant led ward round. Post intervention, 67% managed to recall a single member of the treating team, with 67% retaining this information 5 days later, a dramatic improvement. ID cards were then trialed on one surgical ward, demonstrating equally impressive results with over 87% of patients recalling their named consultant following ID card implementation, up from 54% initially. Similar trends were demonstrated for recalling other treating team members. This simple measure improved patients ability to recall and retain names of a least a single member of their treating team, encouraged communication between patients and medical team and ultimately improved patient satisfaction and quality of care. ID cards were quick and easy to implement and have been approved by the hospital patient safety committee to implement throughout the Trust.