The usefulness of health education materials in GP waiting rooms

  • Research type

    Research Study

  • Full title

    The usefulness of health education materials in GP waiting rooms: a cross-sectional study

  • IRAS ID

    217441

  • Contact name

    Priya Paudyal

  • Contact email

    p.paudyal@bsms.ac.uk

  • Sponsor organisation

    University of Sussex (Brighton and Sussex Medical School)

  • Duration of Study in the UK

    0 years, 7 months, 17 days

  • Research summary

    Almost all patients visiting their general practice will pass through the waiting room. The GP patient survey conducted in 2015 shows that nearly two thirds of patients normally wait ≤15 minutes after their appointment time to be seen and a long waiting time is associated with poor patient satisfaction. This time spent in the waiting room could instead be used as an opportunity for health education through posters, leaflets or electronic media, and education in the waiting room has been associated with increased patient satisfaction.

    This project aims to determine the variety of health education materials available in the general practice waiting room, and to determine patients’ opinions on the usefulness of these materials. The study will take place in multiple general practices in Brighton and Hove and will be comprised of two parts.
    The first part will be a survey of patients using an anonymous, self-completed questionnaire which will be handed out to patients in the waiting room. The questionnaire will include: demographic information, length of time spent in the waiting room, and will use a 5-point scale to rate the participant’s agreement with statements on noticeability, attractiveness and usefulness.
    The second part will be a cross-sectional survey of the number of different health education materials and media available in the waiting room and the variety of topics covered. It will also assess their readability, accessibility and overall design based on guidelines from the Office for Disability Issues and the European Commission.

    The findings from this study will be highly relevant to healthcare professionals when recommending sources of information that will be useful to patients, and also to policy makers in deciding the most effective and accessible way to publish healthcare information.

  • REC name

    West of Scotland REC 3

  • REC reference

    16/WS/0263

  • Date of REC Opinion

    22 Dec 2016

  • REC opinion

    Favourable Opinion