Patient comfort in pre-hospital emergency care: A challenge to clinicians

Aim: The aim of this paper is to report on a study that compared ambulanceclinicians’ views of two different types of patient coverings, focusing on corecaring concepts such as comfort, dignity, and safety.Design: Ambulance clinicians’ views were gathered in respect of two types ofpatient coverings, and 128 ambulance patients were randomly distributed into acontrol or experimental group receiving respectively either the traditional cottonblanket or a multi-layered TelesPro rescue covering. Views were gathered using ashort questionnaire developed by the authors.Findings: Ambulance clinicians, in their own view, maintained the core caringconcepts no matter which type of covering was used. Findings suggest stronglythat the rescue covering provided for a superior patient experience in respect ofall core concepts and one functional aspect.Conclusions: Ambulance clinicians undertake caring that encompasses thecore caring concepts of comfort, safety, and dignity, while remaining vigilant tothreats to these constituents of caring.