Doctor-Parent Interactions With Medical Scribes

The purpose of the study is to collect outcomes related to a quality improvement project assessing the feasibility and effectiveness of a medical scribe program in which medical scribes accompany clinicians during their visits with patients. The medical scribes involved in the project are professional scribes and medical students who will accompany clinicians during patient visits and takes notes, enabling the clinician to engage more directly with the patient.

Study Overview

• Status: Completed
• Conditions: Burnout, Professional
• Intervention / Treatment: Other: Medical Scribe

Detailed Description

The study has several specific objectives. This study aims to examine the impact of using medical scribes on (1) patient experience (e.g. patient satisfaction) (2) clinician experience (e.g. stress load, burnout, evaluation of the visit, amount of time spent after hours inputting notes), and (3) clinician-patient interaction (e.g. patient and clinician engagement during the visit).

• Study Type: Interventional
• Enrollment (Actual): 732
• Phase: Not Applicable

Contacts and Locations

Study Locations

• United States
  • Pennsylvania
    • Hershey, Pennsylvania, United States, 17033
      • Hope Drive Pediatric Clinic

Participation Criteria

Eligibility Criteria

• Ages Eligible for Study: 18 years and older (Adult, Older Adult)
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: No
• Genders Eligible for Study: All

Description

Provider Participants

Inclusion Criteria:

1. Attending clinicians with privileges at Penn State Hershey Children's Hospital and/or the Penn State Hershey Internal Medicine. This may include attending MDs or DOs and Nurse Practitioners (NPs).
2. Voluntary participation in the medical scribe QI project.
3. Consents to participate in the study.

Exclusion Criteria:

1. Clinician is not participating in the scribe project.
2. Clinician does not consent to participate in the research portion of this project.

Patient Participants

Inclusion Criteria:

1. Patient (if 18 years or older) or parent/guardian (P/G) of patient being seen by a participating clinician.
2. Patient was not seen by a resident or medical student prior to meeting with clinician.
3. English speaking/reading.
4. Patient or P/G has capacity to consent.

Exclusion Criteria:

1. Patient is seeing a clinician who has not consented to participate in the research portion of the study.
2. Non-English speaking/reading.
3. Patient or P/G lacks capacity to consent.

Study Plan

How is the study designed?

Design Details

• Primary Purpose: Other
• Allocation: N/A
• Interventional Model: Single Group Assignment
• Masking: None (Open Label)

Number of Arms

1

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm	Intervention / Treatment
Other: Pediatric Clinicians; Survey data will be gathered from pediatric clinicians and also parents of pediatric patients at two time periods. At baseline, no Medical Scribes will be working with the clinicians, and then several months later, data will be gathered when Medical scribes ARE working with clinicians.	Other: Medical Scribe; Trained Medical Scribes will be present in the exam room to take notes on the the electronic medical record so that clinicians can focus all their attention to the interaction with the patient and parent.

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Clinician Burnout	Survey questions will assess clinician burnout using validated measures.	1 year

Collaborators and Investigators

• Sponsor: Milton S. Hershey Medical Center
• Investigators: Principal Investigator: Benjamin Levi, M.D., Ph.D., Departments of Humanities & Pediatrics

Publications and helpful links

Helpful Links

• Manuscript on impact of scribe intervention on documentation
• Manuscript on impact of scribe intervention on relative value units (RVUs)

Study record dates

Study Major Dates

• Study Start (Actual): September 30, 2017
• Primary Completion (Actual): June 29, 2018
• Study Completion (Actual): December 31, 2022

Study Registration Dates

• First Submitted: March 15, 2018
• First Submitted That Met QC Criteria: March 21, 2018
• First Posted (Actual): March 22, 2018

Study Record Updates

• Last Update Posted (Estimate): January 10, 2023
• Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria: January 9, 2023
• Last Verified: January 1, 2023

More Information

Terms related to this study

• Keywords: Outpatient; EHR; Medical Scribe
• Additional Relevant MeSH Terms: Behavioral Symptoms; Stress, Psychological; Occupational Stress; Occupational Diseases; Burnout, Psychological; Burnout, Professional
• Other Study ID Numbers: STUDY00007664

Plan for Individual participant data (IPD)

• Plan to Share Individual Participant Data (IPD)?: Yes
• IPD Plan Description: The study PI will share our study protocol, instruments, and published papers (which include our analytic approach).
• IPD Sharing Time Frame: Study information will be shared upon request to the study PI (Levi), and will be available through 6-30-26.
• IPD Sharing Access Criteria: Any interested researcher should contact the PI at: BHLevi@psu.edu.
• IPD Sharing Supporting Information Type: Study Protocol; Statistical Analysis Plan (SAP); Informed Consent Form (ICF)

Drug and device information, study documents

• Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated drug product: No
• Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated device product: No