Attitudes, experiences, and safety behaviours of adolescents and young adults who read visit notes: Opportunities to engage patients early in their care

Barbara D Lam; Fabienne Bourgeois; Catherine M DesRoches; Zhiyong Dong; Sigall K Bell

doi:10.7861/fhj.2021-0118

Attitudes, experiences, and safety behaviours of adolescents and young adults who read visit notes: Opportunities to engage patients early in their care

Future Healthc J. 2021 Nov;8(3):e585-e592. doi: 10.7861/fhj.2021-0118.

Authors

Barbara D Lam¹, Fabienne Bourgeois², Catherine M DesRoches¹, Zhiyong Dong¹, Sigall K Bell¹

Affiliations

¹ Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Boston, MA, USA.
² Boston Children's Hospital, Boston, MA, USA.

Abstract

The Cures Act made access to electronic visit notes ('open notes') nearly universal across the USA, and efforts to share open notes with patients are underway worldwide. This landmark policy change provides an opportunity to engage adolescents and young adults (AYA) early in their care, yet little is known about their attitudes related to reading notes. We compared the responses of 332 AYA (13-25 years old) and 6,914 adults (>25 years old) in a 2016 survey at two USA academic adult and paediatric hospitals. Over 85% of AYA and adults with available notes reported reading at least one note in the prior year. AYA reported similar benefits from note-reading to adults in 15 outcomes related to engagement, relational effects and safety behaviours, supporting efforts to engage AYA as partners in their care using open notes.

Keywords: adolescents and young adults; open notes; patient safety.