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Description
Background: Non-Veteran Affair (VA) mental health care facilities are admitting increased numbers of military affiliated members due to recent changes, allowing veterans to outsource healthcare at civilian treatment centers. The VA reports less than 9 million veterans enrolled in VA services, leaving over 50% seeking treatment from civilian providers. Given

Background: Non-Veteran Affair (VA) mental health care facilities are admitting increased numbers of military affiliated members due to recent changes, allowing veterans to outsource healthcare at civilian treatment centers. The VA reports less than 9 million veterans enrolled in VA services, leaving over 50% seeking treatment from civilian providers. Given the high prevalence of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) in the military population, it is imperative to implement a valid and reliable screening tool at primary care facilities to ensure timely and accurate diagnosis and treatment.

Method: This project aimed to provide an evidence-based education for intake nurses to understand prevalence of PTSD and to use a screening tool Primary Care PTSD for DSM-5 (PC-PTSD-5) in a non-VA behavioral health facility.

Setting: The project site was a civilian behavioral health facility located in West Phoenix Metropolitan area. The behavioral health facility serves mental health and substance abuse needs. Project implementation focused on the intake department.

Measures: Sociodemographic data, PTSD diagnosis criteria, prevalence and PC-PTDSD-5 screening tool knowledge collected from pre and posttest evaluation. Patients’ charts for those admitted 6-week before and 6-week after the education to calculate numbers of screening tools completed by nurses at intake assessment.

Data analysis: Descriptive statistics was used to describe the sample and key measures; the Wilcoxon Signed Rank Test was used to examine differences between pre-test and post-test scores. Cohen’s effect size was used to estimate clinical significance.

Results: A total of 23 intake nurses (87.0% female, 65.2% 20-39 years old, 52.2% Caucasian, 95.6% reported having 0-10 years of experience, 56.5% completed Associate’s degree) received the education. For PTSD-related knowledge, the pre-test score (Mdn = 6.00) was significantly lower than the post-test score (Mdn = 10.00; Z= -4.23, p < .001), suggesting an increase of PTSD knowledge among nurses after the education. Regarding the diagnosis, the percentage of patients who were diagnosed with PTSD increased from (0.02% to 20% after the education).

Discussion: An evidence-based education aimed at enhancing intake nurses’ knowledge, confidence and skills implementing a brief and no-cost PTSD screening tool showed positive results, including an increase of PTSD diagnosis. The implementation of this screening tool in a civilian primary mental health care facility was feasible and helped patients connect to PTSD treatment in a timely fashion. Continued use of paper version of screening tool will be maintained at facility as an intermediary solution until final approval through parent company is received to implement into electronic medical records.
ContributorsCowart, Amanda (Author) / Chen, Angela (Thesis advisor)
Created2020-05-06
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Description
Advance care planning (ACP) is the act of deciding ones wishes at the end-of-life and making those wishes known. Healthcare providers rely on these wishes to provide end-of-life care. Despite the impact ACP has on quality of life at the end-of-life, most conversations remain undocumented. Even when ACP conversations take

Advance care planning (ACP) is the act of deciding ones wishes at the end-of-life and making those wishes known. Healthcare providers rely on these wishes to provide end-of-life care. Despite the impact ACP has on quality of life at the end-of-life, most conversations remain undocumented. Even when ACP conversations take place, completion rates remain at an all-time low. This report explored the impact of appointment call reminders and patient portal messages on advance directive (AD) completion and documentation in the EHR. Following completion, a primary care practice experienced an increase in ACP conversation and ACP completion in the EHR. This report will discuss the methods utilized to improve ACP completion.
ContributorsDaily, Stephanie M. (Author) / Mangold, Kara (Thesis advisor)
Created2019-04-28
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Description
Purpose: To assess study participants behavioral responses and perception of effectiveness of an activity tracking device to increase physical activity. Obesity is an endemic health issue in the U.S. and continues to gain concern for increasing morbidity and mortality rates. Benefits of physical activity are firmly established across healthcare disciplines

Purpose: To assess study participants behavioral responses and perception of effectiveness of an activity tracking device to increase physical activity. Obesity is an endemic health issue in the U.S. and continues to gain concern for increasing morbidity and mortality rates. Benefits of physical activity are firmly established across healthcare disciplines to combat and prevent obesity, yet sedentary behaviors continue to be on the rise. The use of wearable technology, that provides real-time feedback of activity, has been identified as a promising tool for increasing physical activity.

Methods: Analysis of a subset of questions from a larger survey was used to evaluate wearable device attitudes and behavior changes over time. Convenience sample (n=10), ages >18, required enrollment in a clinic-based weight and wellness program (WWP) to participate. The survey questions assessed effectiveness of wearable device on a 0-10 motivation scale to increase physical activity and a self- assessment of behavioral changes at specific intervals over a 6-month period. Descriptive statistics and non-parametric, two-tailed tests will be used to analyze the data. Due to the necessity of detecting minute differences with the small sample size, the significance level will be tested at the p<0.10.

Results: Participants >18 years of age, enrolled in a WWP (n=10) included 20% male and 80% female. Although a 12.3% increase in the mean score was found from week-1 to 6-months, the results were not statistically conclusive to the effectiveness of self-motivation to increase activity by participants wearing an activity tracking device; however, results are statistically significant for participants to increase activity with behavior changes based on device dashboard.

Conclusions: It is recommended for primary care providers to encourage the use of an activity tracking wearable device for behavior change to increase activity.
ContributorsCarroccio, Tanya (Author) / Nunez, Diane (Thesis advisor)
Created2018-04-28