Supervisors info:
Δούρος Κωνσταντίνος, Αναπληρωτής Καθηγητής,Ιατρική Σχολή,ΕΚΠΑ
Παπαευαγγέλου Βασιλική, Καθηγήτρια,Ιατρική Σχολή,ΕΚΠΑ
Πρίφτης Κωνσταντίνος, Αφ.Αναπληρωτής Καθηγητής,Ιατρική Σχολή,ΕΚΠΑ
Summary:
Introduction: The stethoscope has been considered as an instrument that is characterized by great variation in findings depending on the examiner. An additional problem is the lack of common nomenclature and categorization of respiratory sounds, although in recent years there has been an effort by the scientific community to apply common terminology. However, stethoscope and auscultation are an integral part of any clinical examination, especially when it comes to the respiratory system.
Aim: The present study aims to evaluate the confidence of health care professionals in auscultation findings during the diagnostic approach of the patient with respiratory disease. At the same time, and for comparison purposes, the confidence of healthcare professionals in chest x-ray and the information obtained through the medical history was studied. The initial assumption was that years of experience would be positively correlated with confidence in the stethoscope as a diagnostic tool.
Material: The material consists of 225 health professionals who responded to an electronically designed questionnaire (out of a total of 1000 that was sent). Participants were asked to complete the questionnaire anonymously.
Methods: This is a progressive study based on the answers to a questionnaire consisting of closed-ended questions that corresponded to scales that had already been developed and used by previous researchers. In the questionnaire, the scale that measured doctors' views on their therapeutic preferences consisted of a 5-point scale ranging from 1: strongly disagree to 5: strongly agree. Statistical analysis was performed with SPSS 21.0 and the level of statistical significance was set at p <0.05.
Results: From the analysis of the demographic data of the sample, the largest percentage of doctors (51, 2%) stated that they work in a primary clinic while the rest either work in the hospital (33.6%) or in both (15.2%). The largest percentage of respondents (94.7%) are pediatricians, while more than half (52.3%) have been practicing medicine for less than ten years. 85.8% of the respondents have high confidence in the stethoscope compared to 70.7% and 83.2% who have high confidence in the radiograph and clinical information, respectively. The stethoscope is the diagnostic tool that gathers the highest percentage of confidence, although in all the above diagnostic means the degree of confidence is higher than 70%.
No correlation was found between the degree of confidence in the stethoscope and the specialty, the place of medical work (primary care or hospital) and the years of medical experience. Accordingly, no correlation was proved between the confidence in medical history and those three factors. Moreover, there is no correlation between the degree of confidence in the chest x-ray and the place where the specialty is practiced, or the years of practice. However, there is a positive correlation between the degree of confidence in the chest x-ray and the specialty (rs =0.148 p =0.031), with pediatricians having the greatest confidence in chest x-ray findings.
Conclusions: The stethoscope is the diagnostic tool in which health professionals have more confidence than the other two ways of making a medical decision. Pediatricians seem to trust chest x-ray more than other specialties. Finally, according to the results, years of medical experience do not affect the diagnostic tool (medical history, auscultation, x-ray) which is used for medical decision.
Keywords:
Stethoscope, Auscultation, Trust, Healthcare Professionals, Diagnosis
