Health Literacy among Non-Familial Caregivers of Older Adults: A Study Conducted in Tuscany (Italy).

Many older adults who live at home depend on a caregiver. When familial support cannot provide the necessary care, paid caregivers are frequently hired. Health literacy (HL) is the knowledge and competence required of people to meet the complex demands of health in modern society. The aim of this study is to assess the HL level of paid non-familial caregivers who were enrolled through two different sources: from the homes of assisted people in two Tuscan health districts (first sample) and during job interviews in a home care agency operating in Florence (second sample). The two different recruitment contexts allow us to provide a broader view of the phenomenon, presenting a picture of the HL level of those who are already working and those who are looking for a new job in this field. One-on-one face-to-face interviews, which include the administration of the Newest Vital Sign (NVS) to measure HL, were conducted. Recruitment resulted in 84 caregivers in the first sample and 68 in the second sample. In the first sample, the mean age was 51.2 ± 9 years; 94% of the participants were women. A high likelihood or likelihood of inadequate HL (i.e., a low level of HL) was found in 73.8% of cases. In the second sample, the mean age was 43.7 ± 11.5 years; 83.8% of the participants were women, and 80.9% had a low level of HL. In both samples, HL was statistically associated with the level of understanding of the Italian language. In conclusion, inadequate HL is an under-recognized problem among non-familial caregivers. Educational programs that aim to increase HL skills could be an effective approach to improving the qualification of informal healthcare professionals.

Non-familial paid caregivers as potential flu carriers and cause of spread: the primary prevention of flu measured through their adhesion to flu vaccination campaigns-A Florentine experience.

Introduction: Influenza vaccination is recommended for caregivers of elderly people. In a study aimed at assessing the level of health literacy (HL) in a sample non-familial caregivers in the Florence Health District (Tuscany), data were collected regarding access and adherence to the flu vaccination campaigns. Methods: The sample consists of 47 non-familial paid caregivers. We collected information regarding socio-demographic characteristics, services provided and daily work time, whether or not influenza vaccination was administered for the 2016/2017 season and in the previous three years. The level of HL was assessed through the Newest Vital Sign. Results: 63.8% of non-familial caregivers have not joined the flu campaigns over the last four years, 14.9% have been vaccinated only sometimes (in some epidemic seasons), and 21.3% have received a flu shot in all the seasons investigated. Most of the non-familial caregivers who do not get vaccinated (27.7%) do not perceive that they are in direct contact with a person at-risk; those who get the vaccine regularly (12.8%) reported they want to protect the assisted person as motivation for vaccine uptake. Vaccination was not associated with HL. Conclusion: Adhesion to anti-flu vaccination campaigns for these homecare workers has been resulted rather poor. Coverage does not seem to be related with HL level. It seems appropriate to promote extensively flu vaccination among family carers by actively offering the vaccination in appropriate forms, places and times, to avoid serious consequences on elderly people with higher risk of comorbidity and frailty.

Process, structural, and outcome quality indicators of nutritional care in nursing homes: a systematic review.

BACKGROUND: The quality of nursing homes (NHs) has attracted a lot of interest in recent years and is one of the most challenging issues for policy-makers. Nutritional care should be considered an important variable to be measured from the perspective of quality management. The aim of this systematic review is to describe the use of structural, process, and outcome indicators of nutritional care in NHs and the relationship among them. METHODS: The literature search was carried out in Pubmed, Embase, Scopus, and Web of Science. A temporal filter was applied in order to select papers published in the last 10 years. All types of studies were included, with the exception of reviews, conference proceedings, editorials, and letters to the editor. Papers published in languages other than English, Italian, and Spanish were excluded. RESULTS: From the database search, 1063 potentially relevant studies were obtained. Of these, 19 full-text articles were considered eligible for the final synthesis. Most of the studies adopted an observational cross-sectional design. They generally assessed the quality of nutritional care using several indicators, usually including a mixture of many different structural, process, and outcome indicators. Only one of the 19 studies described the quality of care by comparing the results with the threshold values. Nine papers assessed the relationship between indicators and six of them described some significant associations-in the NHs that have a policy related to nutritional risk assessment or a suitable scale to weigh the residents, the prevalence or risk of malnutrition is lower. Finally, only four papers of these nine included risk adjustment. This could limit the comparability of the results. CONCLUSION: Our findings show that a consensus must be reached for defining a set of indicators and standards to improve quality in NHs. Establishing the relationship between structural, process, and outcome indicators is a challenge. There are grounds for investigating this theme by means of prospective longitudinal studies that take the risk adjustment into account.

Waist-to-height ratio and its associations with body mass index in a sample of Tuscan children in primary school.

BACKGROUND: Visceral obesity in children increases the risk of developing cardiovascular diseases. To evaluate overweight children, in addition to Body Mass Index (BMI), waist-to-height ratio (WHtR) can be used to predict cardiometabolic risk. The goal of this study is to describe WHtR in a sample of Tuscan children. METHODS: A sample of children living in the province of Pistoia, Tuscany, was measured for the following anthropometric parameters: weight, height, and waist circumference. BMI and WHtR were calculated. For the latter indicator, a threshold of 0.5 was considered as a cardiovascular risk predictor. The subjects were classified into underweight, normal weight, overweight, and obese using Cole's cut-offs. RESULTS: The number of children enrolled were 1575 (821 males; 754 females), aged 6-11 years. Of them, 64.3% were normal weight, 4.9% underweight, 22.3% overweight, and 8.5% obese. Moreover, 12.8% had a WHtR ≥0.5 (85.7% males; 88.7% females). The average WHtR value was 0.45 ± 0.045, and was significantly different as per gender (F = 0.45 vs. M = 0.46). WHtR was significantly correlated with BMI (r = 0.766). CONCLUSION: The average WHtR value was in line with previous studies conducted among children of similar age groups. Large-scale perspective studies are needed to validate the Italian WHtR cut-offs for children.

Mortality after hip fracture in the elderly: The role of a multidisciplinary approach and time to surgery in a retrospective observational study on 23,973 patients.

BACKGROUND: Since most hip fractures occur in fragile patients, an important step forward in the treatment may be a co-managed, multidisciplinary treatment approach with orthopaedic surgeons and geriatricians. This multidisciplinary care model (MCM) is implemented in some Tuscan hospitals, while in hospitals with the usual care model (UCM) medical consultation is required only as deemed necessary by the admitting surgeon. The primary aim of this study was to assess the effect of the MCM on 30-day mortality, compared with the UCM. METHODS: A retrospective study was conducted on patients with main diagnosis of hip fracture, as reported in the hospital admission discharge reports, aged 65 years and older, who underwent surgery in Tuscan hospitals from 2010 to 2013. A multilevel logistic regression model was performed to assess the effect of the MCM vs the UCM. The Charlson Comorbidity Index (CCI) was used as a proxy for case mix complexity. RESULTS: 23,973 patients were included: 23% men and 77% women; the mean age was 83.5 years. The multilevel analysis showed that mortality was significantly higher in the UCM, after adjusting for gender, age, comorbidity and timing of surgery (OR=1.32; 95% CI 1.09-1.59; p=0.004). Surgical delay was not significantly associated with higher mortality rates. CONCLUSIONS: A co-managed approach to hip fracture, with orthopaedic surgeons and geriatricians, offers a multidisciplinary pathway for the elderly and leads to a reduction in mortality after hip fracture surgery.

The right to food, food donation and microbiological problems of food safety: an experience in the territory of Florence.

AIM: The aim of this study is to understand whether the freezing without a rapid blast chiller represents a storage method for food at the end of shelf life that guarantees microbiological food safety, so to be considered an effective tool for the appropriate management of food in charitable organizations. METHODS: The study has been performed on 90 food samples, among those that a charitable foodservice trust receives by the large-scale distribution. The products have been frozen using a domestic refrigerator. The indicators used were: total aerobic microbial count, Escherichia coli, Salmonella spp, Staphylococcus aureus, Campylobacter spp, sulphite reducing clostridia. RESULTS: The results show that the preservation of the chosen fresh products at the end of shelf life in refrigerators, frozen without the use of chillers, is a potential management strategy to avoid the loss of edible food, while maintaining the safety standards.

Assessment of the effectiveness of the universal varicella vaccination program in Toscana (Italy), in the period 2010-2013.

OBJECTIVE: To assess the effectiveness of the varicella vaccination program in Toscana after one dose of vaccine, in the birth cohorts 2008-2011. DESIGN: Varicella vaccine effectiveness (VE) was calculated using the "screening method", based on vaccine coverage (VC) at 24 months and proportion of vaccinated subjects among varicella notified cases (PVC), verified through the Local Health Units' (LHUs) immunization registries. Breakthrough varicella (BV) was defined as a case of varicella occurring in a child vaccinated ≥42 days before the date of disease onset. SETTING AND PARTICIPANTS: The study was conducted in the 12 Tuscan LHUs and included all varicella cases notified in 2010-2013 in children of the birth cohorts 2008-2011. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: BV cases; VE after one dose of varicella vaccine; time interval between varicella vaccination and symptom onset. RESULTS: VC was 79.8%, VE reached 90.8%(95%CI 89.5%-92.0%) and the proportion of BV among notified cases was 26.6%. The median time interval between vaccination and symptom onset was 25 months. CONCLUSIONS: The very low rate of BV cases among vaccinated children confirms the high effectiveness even of a single dose of varicella vaccine and does not support a change of the current immunization schedule.