Infectious Disease Preparedness for Homeless Populations: Recommendations from a Community-Academic Partnership.

BACKGROUND: People experiencing homelessness are at increased risk of infectious disease transmission due to congregate living conditions, barriers to healthcare, and excess burden of underlying chronic disease. OBJECTIVES: We are a multisectoral community-academic partnership working to address the intersecting crises of homelessness and health disparities in Tippecanoe County, Indiana. We offer key recommendations for infectious disease preparedness and risk mitigation for homeless populations based on our ongoing community-based participatory research and lessons learned through COVID-19 response and Monkeypox preparations. LESSONS LEARNED: Infectious disease preparedness and response in homeless populations requires strong local partnerships; ongoing training and support for staff and volunteers of homeless shelters and service agencies; tailored outreach, education, and communication with people experiencing homelessness; and standardized processes for creating, disseminating, enforcing, and evaluating public health policies in homeless shelters. Consistency and open communication are key to a successful community-academic partnership. CONCLUSIONS: Community-academic partnerships are critical to effective infectious disease preparedness in homeless populations. The lessons learned from community-based participatory research with homeless communities and multisectoral partners on the frontline can improve future outbreak and pandemic response for people experiencing homelessness and other vulnerable communities in the United States.

Patient engagement as a core element of translating clinical evidence into practice- application of the COM-B model behaviour change model.

BACKGROUND: The results of rehabilitation trials are often not fully attained when the intervention is implemented beyond the initial trial. One of the key reasons is that a patients' ability and/or capacity to take part in their own healthcare is not considered in the trial design yet has significant impact on the outcomes during the implementation phase. BODY OF TEXT: We propose a shift from a therapist-focus to patient-focus in trial design, through addressing patient engagement as a core consideration in trials. We argue that engaging patients in any rehabilitation program is a process of behavioural change. Exercise prescription is used as an example to illustrate how the Behaviour Change Wheel can be applied to analyse barriers and facilitators associated with patients' capabilities, opportunities and motivations in integrating trial interventions into their daily life. We propose a framework to assist in this shift. CONCLUSION: A core part of implementing rehabilitation interventions at the primary care level requires patient engagement. Related aspects of interventions should be identified and assessed using the COM-B model at the outset of trial design to ensure that the results are realistic, meaningful and transferable, so as to enable real impact.

Rehabilitation programs tested in clinical trials often focus on the therapists' effort and the program itself.Engaging patients in any rehabilitation program is a process of behaviour change of patients.Our proposed framework based on the COM-B model, including the Behaviour Change Wheel, enriches rehabilitation trial design through considering core aspects of patient engagement to ensure the real impact of any rehabilitation program can be achieved.

Using patient self-checklist to improve the documentation of risk of postoperative nausea and vomiting: an implementation project.

BACKGROUND AND AIMS: Postoperative nausea and vomiting (PONV) is a common surgical complication, affecting 30-50% of patients and 80% in high risk populations. Successful prevention and management of PONV relies on accurately assessing individual risk prior to surgery. A valid and reliable Apfel score is commonly used to assess patients' risk. It is however challenging to translate this evidence into clinical practice. This evidence-based project aimed to identify the current practice of assessing and documenting the risk factors of PONV prior to surgery, and to develop strategies to improve the practice. METHODS: The project had three phrases, including forming a team and conducting the baseline audit; identifying problems and developing strategies; and conducting a follow-up tool to assess the impact on compliance with best practice. A research team was formed. A baseline audit was conducted at a public hospital in Victoria in June 2016 to examine PONV risk assessment practice through checking medical files of surgical patients. A getting research into practice audit and feedback tool was used to identify barriers, implementation strategies, stakeholders and resources. After implementation, a second audit was conducted between June and October 2017. Audit criteria were based on a reliable and valid Apfel score. RESULTS: At baseline, accurate PONV risk could only be calculated from 8% of patient files with no file formally recording the risk factors. The proportion of patients with three risk factors preoperatively, indicating high PONV risk, was 5.3%. Barriers identified were the perceived lack of necessity to record the risk, time constraint and too much paperwork. A self-checklist for risk assessment was developed to enable patients to check their own level of risk. Its face validity, construct validity and accuracy were examined. The checklist was then implemented for patients to complete prior to surgery. A number of strategies were used to improve the implementation. The second audit of 1308 files showed that at the end of audit period, 74% of patients had risk assessment conducted and documented postimplementation. 16.8% of the patients were identified as having high PONV risk, nearly triple the number identified at baseline. CONCLUSION: A simple self-checklist of PONV risk was implemented. It greatly improved PONV risk assessment and documentation in a public hospital in Australia and enabled the identification of patients at high risk.