@article {Herrin182, author = {Jeph Herrin and Kathleen G Harris and Kevin Kenward and Stephen Hines and Maulik S Joshi and Dominick L Frosch}, title = {Patient and family engagement: a survey of US hospital practices}, volume = {25}, number = {3}, pages = {182--189}, year = {2016}, doi = {10.1136/bmjqs-2015-004006}, publisher = {BMJ Publishing Group Ltd}, abstract = {Background Patient and family engagement (PFE) in healthcare is an important element of the transforming healthcare system; however, the prevalence of various PFE practices in the USA is not known.Objective We report on a survey of hospitals in the USA regarding their PFE practices during 2013{\textendash}2014.Results The response rate was 42\%, with 1457 acute care hospitals completing the survey. We constructed 25 items to summarise the responses regarding key practices, which fell into three broad categories: (1) organisational practices, (2) bedside practices and (3) access to information and shared decision-making. We found a wide range of scores across hospitals. Selected findings include: 86\% of hospitals had a policy for unrestricted visitor access in at least some units; 68\% encouraged patients/families to participate in shift-change reports; 67\% had formal policies for disclosing and apologising for errors; and 38\% had a patient and family advisory council. The most commonly reported barrier to increased PFE was {\textquoteleft}competing organisational priorities{\textquoteright}.Summary Our findings indicate that there is a large variation in hospital implementation of PFE practices, with competing organisational priorities being the most commonly identified barrier to adoption.}, issn = {2044-5415}, URL = {https://qualitysafety.bmj.com/content/25/3/182}, eprint = {https://qualitysafety.bmj.com/content/25/3/182.full.pdf}, journal = {BMJ Quality \& Safety} }