Accepted for/Published in: JMIR Perioperative Medicine
Date Submitted: Jun 10, 2022
Open Peer Review Period: Jun 10, 2022 - Jun 20, 2022
Date Accepted: Nov 23, 2022
Date Submitted to PubMed: Nov 24, 2022
(closed for review but you can still tweet)
Experiences of Healthcare Professionals Working Extra Weekends to Reduce COVID-19 Related Surgical Backlog – a cross sectional study
ABSTRACT
Background:
During 2020 during quiescent periods of the COVID-19 pandemic, we implemented a weekend scheduled pediatric surgery program to reduce COVID-19 related backlogs.
Objective:
We sought to evaluate staff perceptions and their level of satisfaction and experiences on working extra scheduled weekend elective surgical cases at the end of the three-month pilot phase of ORRACLE-Xtra.
Methods:
With institutional approval we completed a cross-sectional survey of staff who volunteered working weekends. Staff were invited to complete an online survey that was developed and tested prior to distribution.
Results:
A total of 81 out of 118 eligible staff responded to the survey for a response rate of 69%. Staff worked a median of 2 weekend lists (Interquartile range: 1 to 9). Almost 80% (65/82) of staff were satisfied or very satisfied with working the extra weekend elective lists with surgeons and surgical trainees reporting the highest levels of satisfaction. A sense of accomplishment was significantly associated with working on the weekend with an odds ratio of 19.97 (95% Confidence Intervals [CI] 1.792 to 222.628; p = 0.0149). Most staff were willing to work future weekend surgical lists that included longer and more complex cases, with a preference for non-summer months.
Conclusions:
Staff working the first three-months of the ORRACLE Xtra program reported satisfaction with working weekends. Information on preferences of working weekends was useful to the planning and implementation of additional surgical backlog recovery work. Institutions planning on implementing COVID-19 surgical backlog work may benefit from gathering key information from their staff Clinical Trial: N/A
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