A warm handoff can be an important part of your patient care routine. It is important to the patient, the previous healthcare provider and the current healthcare provider so that the best possible care can be given. A warm handoff can reduce the risk of important patient needs slipping through the cracks. If you are a member of a healthcare team here is a simple checklist you can use to provide a proper warm handoff. There are more ideas you can add to your checklist as you start to practice it and decide you need to change it. A warm handoff can consist of a short meeting with the patient and the new healthcare member and can include the following:
Introduce new staff to the patient
Summarize reason for the patient visit
Highlight important changes
Ask the patient for their remarks
Bring up any additional issues or concerns
Here are a few brief examples of a warm handoff:
Before your shift is over, introduce your patient to the person who is replacing you.
Have a brief meeting with the new healthcare provider to highlight important patient care needs.
Make sure that your documentation is up to date and review it with the patient care team before leaving.
At the end of a patient visit, make sure the patient is seen one last time to be given a visit summary and ongoing follow-up care needs.
For example, the team member who rooms the patient and takes chief complaint and vitals should hand the patient off to the clinician in person, in front of the patient. This approach gives the patient the opportunity to clarify or add to the information the clinician receives.
A good handoff should be clear, concise and complete. While this can be challenging to do, it should keep the listener's attention and remain focused through the entirety of the presentation. It often starts with room number and patient demographics (name, age, & gender) to identify the patient to the listener.
A patient handoff is the transfer of care from one person to another. Handoffs occur frequently in health care—at the end and beginning of a shift, from front desk to medical assistant to clinician, and on the phone when being transferred.
Essentially, it's the ability to bump a call from one user to another. There are two ways to transfer a call: cold (blind) and warm (attended). Simply put, the main difference is whether or not the call is introduced or announced prior to actually transferring.
Primary care clinicians may preferentially perform warm handoffs for patients they perceive are the least likely to attend an appointment, such as patients who have severe mental health conditions or substance use disorders, low health literacy, reluctance to engage with behavioral health services, disorganization, ...
A typical referral gives someone information about how to reach the services they need but may leave them to contact those services on their own. In contrast, a warm hand-off is a transfer of care between service providers through face-to-face, phone or video interaction in the presence of the person being helped.
The term “warm handoff” originated in customer service where it is used to describe referrals that ensure that the customer is connected to someone who can provide what he or she needs.
Introduction: My name is Greg O'Connell, I am a delightful, colorful, talented, kind, lively, modern, tender person who loves writing and wants to share my knowledge and understanding with you.
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