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The team said the tool could help reduce patients\u2019 embarrassment around discussing bodily fluids with clinicians (Anthony Devlin\/PA) <\/p>\nA \u201creally simple\u201d tool that makes it easier for people to describe the colour of bodily fluids could have a \u201chuge impact\u201d on patient care, researchers have announced.<\/p>\n
A team at Edinburgh Napier University has developed a standardised colour palette that can be used by patients and clinicians when describing the colour of fluids like urine and sputum.<\/p>\n
This information can play a key role in diagnosing, investigating and prescribing for a wide range of medical conditions.<\/p>\n
The free online tool, called What Colour Is It?, resembles a paint colour card, with palettes of either 13 or 15 clinically-relevant colours for identifying the colour of sputum, urine and faeces.<\/p>\n
Each colour on the palette has a unique \u201chex code\u201d \u2013 an international code for colour identification \u2013 that can be entered into a patient\u2019s notes, which other clinicians can then use to find the exact colour being referred to by the patient.<\/p>\n
The researchers said by reducing the level of subjectivity when describing different colours, the tool can help make diagnosis faster and more accurate, and so help improve patient outcomes.<\/p>\n
They also said having a chart to refer to can reduce the embarrassment that can make it difficult for patients to discuss bodily fluids with clinicians.<\/p>\n
Hazel McPhillips, an advanced nurse practitioner and a lecturer at Napier, said: \u201cWe rely on our patients describing a colour and us assuming that we\u2019re thinking the same colour.<\/p>\n
The team said the tool could help reduce patients\u2019 embarrassment around discussing bodily fluids with clinicians (Anthony Devlin\/PA) <\/p>\n
\u201cWe prescribe, we diagnose, we investigate based on the description of that colour, and that\u2019s really subjective.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn our documentation we then write, \u2018the patient says it\u2019s greeny-brown or bluey-black\u2019, or whatever colour it\u2019s described as, and the next person may have another interpretation of that colour in their head.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis toolkit really standardises that. It takes the subjectivity out of it and makes sure everyone\u2019s working from the same colour.\u201d<\/p>\n
She went on to describe the impact this could have on patient outcomes.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe know in clinical practice that whenever we look at accidents, there are investigations, there are issues, it\u2019s usually down to poor documentation or poor communication.<\/p>\n
\u201cAlmost every fatal accident inquiry you ever look at ends with, \u2018communication could have been better, documentation could have been better\u2019.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is a very small thing, but if we can standardise that small part, that could have a huge impact on patient care and actually on safety as well.\u201d<\/p>\n
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The online tool resembles a paint colour card, with a standardised list of colours for different bodily fluids <\/p>\n
The team said the tool could help communicate accurately during remote appointments, such as over NHS24 or when dialling 111.<\/p>\n
They said a visual chart can also help overcome communication barriers due to factors like language, age, and certain medical conditions, which can make it difficult for patients to describe colours verbally.<\/p>\n
Business improvement consultant Stephen Yorkstone\u00a0explained: \u201cThere are so many reasons that it\u2019s helpful to use.<\/p>\n
\u201cKids, for example, might not have the same words for colours that we do, (likewise) people from different parts of the world, or with different language abilities.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut also we know of one nurse who\u2019s using it with stroke patients who have something called aphasia, which means they can see, they can understand, they can think just fine, but getting words out is really hard.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut this means that for them, a conversation that would be a struggle becomes much more seamless and much more easy.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mr Yorkstone added that the \u201csimplicity\u201d of the tool is key to its effectiveness.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a dead simple website that you can load on your phone, because clinical folk use their phones all the time nowadays, and you just click a button and it opens a colour scale,\u201d he explained.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou can pull it out of your pocket, point at a colour so that you can communicate about colours more clearly clinically.\u201d<\/p>\n
The team launched the tool four weeks ago and, so far, it is being used by about 225 people in a number of countries, in medical specialisms as wide-ranging as nursing, physiotherapy and dentistry.<\/p>\n
Mr Yorkstone said: \u201cWe know they\u2019re using it for about a minute at a time and, actually, it takes less than a minute to open it, point at the colour with the patient and do that.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo, we\u2019re pretty confident that it\u2019s starting to be used.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd we\u2019ve got users from across the UK, America, Norway, Sweden and Australia already.\u201d<\/p>\n
The team said they hope the tool will become \u201ca normal part of our healthcare system\u201d used by all professions across all healthcare fields.<\/p>\n
Ms McPhillips said: \u201cIt\u2019s going to make so many things so much safer and much more simple for patients as well as staff.\u201d<\/p>\n
The What Colour Is It tool can be found at blogs.napier.ac.uk\/wcii.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A \u201creally simple\u201d tool that makes it easier for people to describe the colour of bodily fluids could…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":225915,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[40056,103,61,60,116133,782,34939,9036,1577],"class_list":{"0":"post-225914","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-health","8":"tag-diagnosis","9":"tag-health","10":"tag-ie","11":"tag-ireland","12":"tag-napier-university","13":"tag-nhs","14":"tag-pa-exclusive","15":"tag-scotland","16":"tag-uk"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225914","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=225914"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225914\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/225915"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=225914"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=225914"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=225914"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}