The role of unregulated care providers in managing heart failure patients in long-term care facilities.

AIMS AND OBJECTIVES: Heart failure is a complex syndrome in which abnormal heart function results in clinical symptoms and signs of low cardiac output and/or pulmonary or systemic congestion. Heart failure is common among long-term care residents, and is associated with significant morbidity and acute care utilisation. Heart failure guidelines endorse standard therapies, yet long-term care residents are less likely to receive recommended treatments. The objective of this study is to understand the perceptions and potential role of unregulated care providers in contributing to better heart failure management among long-term care residents. DESIGN: Focus group interviews. METHODS: This qualitative study employed focus groups to explore perceptions from 24 unregulated care providers in three Ontario, Canada long-term care homes, about barriers to the optimal management of heart failure. RESULTS: Three overarching concepts emerged characterising unregulated care providers' experiences in caring for residents with heart failure in long-term care: (1) the complexity of providing heart failure care in a long-term care setting, (2) striving for resident-centred decision making and (3) unregulated care providers role enactment nested within an interprofessional team in long-term care. These concepts reflect the complex interplay between individual unregulated care providers and residents, and heart failure-related, socio-cultural and organisational factors that influence heart failure care processes in the long-term care system. CONCLUSIONS: Optimising the management of heart failure in long-term care is contingent on greater engagement of unregulated care providers as active partners in the interprofessional care team. Interventions to improve heart failure management in long-term care must ensure that appropriate education is provided to all long-term care staff, including unregulated care providers, and in a manner that fosters greater and more effective interprofessional collaboration. RELEVANCE TO CLINICAL PRACTICE: Active and collaborative engagement unregulated care providers has the potential to improve the management of heart failure in long-term care residents.