Informed consent in senile cataract extraction
L. W. Morgan and I. R. Schwab
One day after surgery for senile cataract, we interviewed 50 patients to
determine what percentage of the preoperative informed consent was
retained. No patient felt less inclined to undergo surgery after hearing
the informed consent and all patients believed the preoperative explanation
had been adequate. This study found retention of relevant information was
only 37% when assessed by ten standard questions. Only two (4%) of the
patients remembered more than two of the five risks of surgery. Blindness,
the most frequently recalled, was known by only 17 (34%). More than 80%
failed to recall either hemorrhage (46/50), infection (47/50), failure of
the procedure to improve visual acuity (42/50), or death (44/50) as other
complications. Only 20% (10/50) would have remembered to protect the
operated-on eye. Patients denied prior counseling for four of the ten
questions (mean). Factors related to poor retention include advanced age
and less than a high school education. Previous cataract surgery, level of
anxiety prior to surgery, and the patient's sex did not appear to influence
retention.
