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Storytelling as a communication tool for health consumers: development of an intervention for parents of children with croup. Stories to communicate health information

BACKGROUND: Stories may be an effective tool to communicate with and influence patients because of their ability to engage the reader. The objective of this paper is to describe the development of a story-based intervention for delivery of health evidence to parents of children with croup for use in...

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Autores principales: Hartling, Lisa, Scott, Shannon, Pandya, Rena, Johnson, David, Bishop, Ted, Klassen, Terry P
Formato: Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: BioMed Central 2010
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2940891/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20813044
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1471-2431-10-64
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author Hartling, Lisa
Scott, Shannon
Pandya, Rena
Johnson, David
Bishop, Ted
Klassen, Terry P
author_facet Hartling, Lisa
Scott, Shannon
Pandya, Rena
Johnson, David
Bishop, Ted
Klassen, Terry P
author_sort Hartling, Lisa
collection PubMed
description BACKGROUND: Stories may be an effective tool to communicate with and influence patients because of their ability to engage the reader. The objective of this paper is to describe the development of a story-based intervention for delivery of health evidence to parents of children with croup for use in a randomized controlled trial. METHODS: A creative writer interviewed parents of children with croup presenting to the pediatric emergency department (ED) and drafted stories. We revised the stories based on written participant feedback and edited the stories to incorporate research evidence and health information. An illustrator and graphic designer developed story booklets which were evaluated through focus groups. RESULTS: Ten participants provided feedback on the five stories drafted by the creative writer. Participants liked the concept but found the writing overly sophisticated and wanted more character development and more medical/health information. Participants highlighted specific story content that they liked and disliked. The revised stories were evaluated through focus groups involving eight individuals. Feedback was generally positive; one participant questioned the associated costs. Participants liked the graphics and layout; felt that they could identify with the stories; and felt that it was easier to get information compared to a standard medical information sheet. Participants provided feedback on the story content, errors and inconsistencies, and preferences of writing style and booklet format. Feedback on how to package the stories was provided by attendees at a national meeting of pediatric emergency researchers. CONCLUSIONS: Several challenges arose during the development of the stories including: staying true to the story versus being evidence based; addressing the use of the internet by consumers as a source of health information; balancing the need to be comprehensive and widely applicable while being succinct; considerations such as story length, reading level, narrative mode, representation of different demographics and illness experiences, graphics and layout. The process was greatly informed by feedback from the end-user group. This allowed us to shape our products to ensure accuracy, credibility, and relevance. Our experience is valuable for further work in the area of stories and narratives, as well as more broadly for identifying and developing communication strategies for healthcare consumers.
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spelling pubmed-29408912010-09-17 Storytelling as a communication tool for health consumers: development of an intervention for parents of children with croup. Stories to communicate health information Hartling, Lisa Scott, Shannon Pandya, Rena Johnson, David Bishop, Ted Klassen, Terry P BMC Pediatr Research Article BACKGROUND: Stories may be an effective tool to communicate with and influence patients because of their ability to engage the reader. The objective of this paper is to describe the development of a story-based intervention for delivery of health evidence to parents of children with croup for use in a randomized controlled trial. METHODS: A creative writer interviewed parents of children with croup presenting to the pediatric emergency department (ED) and drafted stories. We revised the stories based on written participant feedback and edited the stories to incorporate research evidence and health information. An illustrator and graphic designer developed story booklets which were evaluated through focus groups. RESULTS: Ten participants provided feedback on the five stories drafted by the creative writer. Participants liked the concept but found the writing overly sophisticated and wanted more character development and more medical/health information. Participants highlighted specific story content that they liked and disliked. The revised stories were evaluated through focus groups involving eight individuals. Feedback was generally positive; one participant questioned the associated costs. Participants liked the graphics and layout; felt that they could identify with the stories; and felt that it was easier to get information compared to a standard medical information sheet. Participants provided feedback on the story content, errors and inconsistencies, and preferences of writing style and booklet format. Feedback on how to package the stories was provided by attendees at a national meeting of pediatric emergency researchers. CONCLUSIONS: Several challenges arose during the development of the stories including: staying true to the story versus being evidence based; addressing the use of the internet by consumers as a source of health information; balancing the need to be comprehensive and widely applicable while being succinct; considerations such as story length, reading level, narrative mode, representation of different demographics and illness experiences, graphics and layout. The process was greatly informed by feedback from the end-user group. This allowed us to shape our products to ensure accuracy, credibility, and relevance. Our experience is valuable for further work in the area of stories and narratives, as well as more broadly for identifying and developing communication strategies for healthcare consumers. BioMed Central 2010-09-02 /pmc/articles/PMC2940891/ /pubmed/20813044 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1471-2431-10-64 Text en Copyright ©2010 Hartling et al; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0 This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
spellingShingle Research Article
Hartling, Lisa
Scott, Shannon
Pandya, Rena
Johnson, David
Bishop, Ted
Klassen, Terry P
Storytelling as a communication tool for health consumers: development of an intervention for parents of children with croup. Stories to communicate health information
title Storytelling as a communication tool for health consumers: development of an intervention for parents of children with croup. Stories to communicate health information
title_full Storytelling as a communication tool for health consumers: development of an intervention for parents of children with croup. Stories to communicate health information
title_fullStr Storytelling as a communication tool for health consumers: development of an intervention for parents of children with croup. Stories to communicate health information
title_full_unstemmed Storytelling as a communication tool for health consumers: development of an intervention for parents of children with croup. Stories to communicate health information
title_short Storytelling as a communication tool for health consumers: development of an intervention for parents of children with croup. Stories to communicate health information
title_sort storytelling as a communication tool for health consumers: development of an intervention for parents of children with croup. stories to communicate health information
topic Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2940891/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20813044
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1471-2431-10-64
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