Patient handling intervention strategies are many and varied. The focus of
interventions has primarily been on the health, safety and welfare of care givers.
Data from 4 EU focus groups and 2 world-wide expert panels were used to evaluate
whether other types of outcomes were perceived as having relative importance.
Qualitative and quantitative analysis showed that organisational and patient
outcomes were also highly rated by the participants. The data showed 12 outcomes
as being of the highest priority with good agreement between the 4 EU sources
(Kendall’s Concordance significant at 0.005). In parallel, a systematic analysis of
patient handling intervention literature was considered to evaluate the qualities of
each study. Using the 12 most important outcomes from the initial study and the
most appropriate and accessible measurement tools from the literature analysis, the
Intervention Evaluation Tool (IET) is proposed. The IET is a single set of
measurements that can be used for evaluating all organisational and individual
patient handling interventions. The IET has been trialled at 2 sites in 4 EU
countries
