How do you handle phone calls from family/others?

Nurses General Nursing

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Specializes in Neuro/Med-Surg.

What do you say when a patient's family member calls from out of town to ask about what is going on with the patient? What about when it is a family member who lives in town and you have met/spoken to in person? What about when the person claims to be POA? What if they say they are the person's spouse/daughter/etc? When I refuse to give information over the phone, citing HIPPA, I get very very angry people. Can I refuse to give any information out over the phone, even if I have already met the person? What about doctor's assistants calling from offices?

If the patient is AXO I just transfer the call to the patient's room. But if they are not, then it puts me into an awkward situation.

Please give me advice about what to say and what (if anything) to chart about this. I have people calling me ALL DAY LONG on my phone. I work in South Florida where a lot of family members live out of state - they have no idea what is going on with Grandma and I feel bad, but I know I can't say anything.

I am so afraid of legal stuff. Sigh.

Thank you for any advice.

Specializes in NICU.

In my hospital we have a security code that we give the patient/family when they are admitted. I only give out information if the person calling knows the security code.

Specializes in Geriatrics.

Unless they are on the list of people I am allowed to give info to, I politely ask that they contact the HCP for info. This goes for people standing in front of me or on the phone, I don't need to get into trouble with HIPPA because some family members insist on being kept up to date w/o premission. If they get nasty, I accidently get disconnected. If in front of me, I suddenly have an emergancy to deal with.

If they don't have a PIN number then I don't give out any information and cite patient privacy. If they don't have the PIN number and the patient is A&O or there is family in the room, then I will offer to transfer the call.

Emily

Specializes in Neuro/Med-Surg.

I wish my hospital had those pin #/security code! Do you find it makes thing easier?

Specializes in Critical Care.

Well, if you can't ask the patient for permission to share information (say they are intubated) then we do follow guidelines. Usually, if lots of family or friends are calling, we refer them to the legal next of kin who is usually empowered to make decisions for that pt. Also, may be able to look to the durable power of attorney for health care, if the patient has an advance directive. Honestly, those pushy types of callers used to bother me but not anymore. I politely explain to them what I can and can't do and that's it. I'm not gonna reinvent the wheel everytime all 50 members of someone's family keeps calling. If it starts to impede care, we get social work involved to help mediate and set up a spokesperson, then we only deal with that spokesperson.

Yes, a PIN or code word is very helpful. You can't identify who is on the other end of the phone, this at least helps you protect your patient. There are a lot of factors that go into relating information to family members. There are also the family members who have "Google MD degrees" who want specific information (like lab results) so they can flaunt their knowledge. Information like that needs to come from the doc, as far as I"m concerned. These type of people like to play one caregiver against another...."well, so and so Nurse said..."I've gotten caught up in that before, won't do it again.

Specializes in home health, dialysis, others.

Every facility must have a policy about dealing w/family members. There should be at most 2 people that can call for info, and everyone else should be directed to those people.

When my mom was in the hospital she told everyone that they could talk to me and asked them to call me with info she didn't understand. (I am about 600 miles away).

Why not offer to help with developing a new policy?

We designate a spokesperson from the get-go for each patient. That person can call and ask whatever they like, but anyone else is just referred to the spokesperson. Sometimes people get mad, but we just explain to them that we're abiding by federal law and protecting the patients' privacy.

Specializes in Acute Care, Rehab, Palliative.

Where I work if they are not the POA they get no information at all.

I just tell them it's against provincial regulations to provide information and ask them to contact the patient's spouse/child/whatever.

Under my provinces' information act, I can't even admit the patient is in hospital.

Try explaining that to the third cousin, four times removed, next door neighbours sister.

We have a code, but often Grandma can't remember what it is, or that we gave it to her. I usually tell the person "I can't give you much information due to the HIPPA law, but I know you are concerned. I can tell you that he/she is resting comfortably. When you come up to see him/her, I will ask him/her if it is OK to tell you more." That usually works for most people because most folks are aware of HIPPA. If they really care, they will come to see Grandma. If I get something like "I live a million miles away." I fall back to "How about calling the family member that has the code, and get either the code, or information from them?" I think this goes over much better that the standard "I can't give you any information due to HIPPA." Most people respond well if you act sympathetic, but hadicapped by that nasty old HIPPA law.;)

At the hospital that I worked at, we didn't have an "official policy" for codes/pin numbers, but many of the nurses instituted them. I often used this, especially if we had long term patients and their family members were coming and going frequently. I spent lots of time on the phone with many angry family members quoting the HIPAA law, and got hung up on a lot...but that's all part of the job. It does put you in an awkward position, but you have to stick with it. We had a MD walk into a room and start talking to a visitor, who he assumed was the patients husband in reference to a possible cancer finding, the patient was coherent enough to know what was going on, but unable to express to the doctor that the visitor that he was talking to was in NO way related to her (she was recovering from surgery). The MD was in such a hurry, and didn't have a fabulous bedside manor to begin with, that he didn't bother to ask how they were related or even listen when the visitor tried to say that he was there to see the patient in the other bed but the other patient was using the bathroom and he was trying to give grandma her privacy! So, whether in person or over the phone--you HAVE to verify in some way, shape or form who you are talking to--HIPAA can be a very dangerous place for health professionals to be stuck...

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