Kids voices: Exploring children's perspective of tonsillectomy surgery.

Abstract

Feedback around the hospital experience is often sought from caregivers; however, consultation with children offers a unique perspective that can also be valuable for quality improvement purposes. There are limited studies collecting direct feedback from children on their surgical and hospital experience, one study highlighting the need for individualised care in a perioperative setting, which can only be discerned through direct and meaningful conversations with children.1 Tonsillectomies are one of the most common childhood surgical procedures.2 This procedure may be a source of great stress to children, amplified by a painful prolonged recovery process, which can last for up to two weeks, as well as other complications such as nausea, vomiting, difficulty swallowing and the fear of bleeding.2, 3 We aimed to assess children's subjective opinion of their hospital stay and recovery post-tonsillectomy through semi-structured phone interviews. Data was prospectively collected as part of an approved institutional audit (Approval No: GEKO 39785).