Abstract 1597P
Background
Comprehensive cancer care includes aspects of hospitality, which relates to providing practical, informational, and emotional services along the care trajectory. We describe the integration of a hospitality perspective into cancer care with the aim of implementing innovative interventions to improve the experience of people affected by cancer, through a unique partnership between a university hospital and a world-renowned hotel school.
Methods
We followed a multi-methods approach in subsequent steps to design hospitality interventions in cancer care, drawing on the expertise of the hotel industry and transferring it to the health sector. In step 1, we identified unmet hospitality needs, based on the computer-assisted textual analysis of free-text comments and descriptive analysis of patient-reported experience measures collected in the large-scale cancer patient survey SCAPE (Swiss Cancer Patient Experiences) conducted in 2018. In step 2, we performed thematic analysis on three focus groups (FG) conducted to validate the unmet hospitality needs and discuss interventions to address them. FGs involved cancer patients (n=7), professionals working at the oncology department of the Lausanne University Hospital CHUV (n=8), and experts in hospitality management (n=6). In step 3, working groups involving participants already included in step 2 (n=12) discussed the feasibility of the interventions.
Results
Overall, we identified nine unsatisfied needs related to hospitality services among people affected by cancer (i.e. To receive information when appointments are delayed), and we designed five interventions to address them: an application dedicated to patients; a welcome kit; hospitality training for oncology teams; a revised integration process for new hospital staff based on the hotel model; and a patient relation manager.
Conclusions
Our findings provide insights into unmet hospitality needs and potential hospitality interventions. Improving the services offered to patients in hospital is an important lever for enhancing their experience and, by extension, optimising communication between patients and professionals, supporting the work of administrative teams, strengthening tools to facilitate patients’ care pathway and providing better overall cancer care.
Clinical trial identification
Editorial acknowledgement
Legal entity responsible for the study
Lausanne University Hospital CHUV.
Funding
Fondation pour le Soutien de la Recherche et du Développement en Oncologie.
Disclosure
All authors have declared no conflicts of interest.