Assessing Patient-provider Interactions During the Preoperative Anesthesia Consult

Study Summary

This will be a prospective, observational, single-center study to evaluate the effect of race and ethnicity on anesthesia provider-patient interactions. The investigators will also attempt to validate a new tool for assessing non-verbal communication during the preanesthesia consult. Masking: 1. Patient 2. Anesthesia providers (attending anesthesiologist and resident or Certified Registered Nurse Anesthetist) The patient and anesthesia provider(s) will not be told that the purpose of the study is to compare provider-patient interactions with minority patients to provider-patient interactions with Caucasian patients. The patient and anesthesia provider will be told that the investigators are conducting a study to evaluate provider-patient communication in the preanesthesia setting. The outcome assessor will be part of the research team. Accordingly, they will not be masked. This is a pilot study void of sample size calculations. The investigators hope to enroll 100-200 patients in the study. While not a randomized study, the investigators hope to achieve a balanced number of minority and Caucasian patients.

Primary Outcome

The score is a sum of four components, each contribute to a score range 0 - 1. 1\) Percent time spent with open body language: defined as the anesthesia provider facing the patient and not placing anything between the anesthesia provider and the patient. 2) Percent time spent interacting with the patient or surrogate: Time spent interacting with the patient is defined as time the physician made eye contact with the patient or surrogate. Time spent talking to the patient, but not making eye cont

Interventions

• OTHER Non-verbal communication score