Buba, Melanie
Dulude, Catherine
O’Donnell, Roisin
Rowan-Legg, Anne
Sloan, Megan
Nelson, Matthew
King, W. James
Article History
Received: 8 July 2022
Accepted: 23 May 2023
First Online: 13 June 2023
Declarations
:
: During the COVID-19 pandemic, the pediatric medicine teams at our hospital pivoted entirely from in-person to virtual family-centered rounds (vFCR) as the standard of care. Virtual family-centered rounds were deemed necessary by our hospital leadership in order to provide safe and high-quality inpatient care during the COVID-19 pandemic. To ensure that vFCR, as the new standard of care, was being closely monitored and to identify and mitigate any potential risks, our project team was asked by hospital leadership to audit this process and collect metrics around stakeholder satisfaction, rounds efficiency, patient safety, and any other important feedback. Despite the fact that the vFCR project was not planned as a formal research or quality improvement study, rather an operational change, MB contacted the Chair of the CHEO REB to discuss the project and methods. This project was deemed to be quality improvement and exempted from full review by our institutional research ethics board (REB). The reviewing REB was the Children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontario IRB#1, IRB00002747.The CHEO REB did not waive the requirement of informed consent. We proceeded using an “opt-out” verbal consent strategy consistent with that used for the pre-pandemic standard of in-person family-centered rounds. Upon admission, all patients sign a general informed consent to treatment and care, “authorizing any steps necessary for staff to perform a general assessment of the patient and his/her condition.” Information about vFCR was circulated electronically to health care providers and provided to patients and families by their bedside nurse. Participants were aware that project team members were auditing the process. They were given the option to participate – or not. Stakeholders could opt-out of the vFCR process at any time, as they were invited to participate on a daily basis.All methods were performed in accordance with the relevant guidelines and regulations as described: ExternalRef removed
: Not applicable.
: The authors declare no competing interests.