[Epidemiology of long-term care: prevalence and utilisation as well as the healthcare of long-term care recipients in Germany]. / Epidemiologie der Pflege: Prävalenz und Inanspruchnahme sowie die gesundheitliche Versorgung von Pflegebedürftigen in Deutschland.

According to official statistics from the German long-term care insurance funds, around six out of every one hundred people with statutory health insurance are considered to be in need of long-term care. In this context, "need of long-term care" is defined according to the Eleventh Book of the Social Code (SGB XI) and therefore follows a demand-driven understanding of care, which also aligns with public discourse.In order to meet the increasing number of people in need of long term care - mostly caused by demographic change - with needs-based service structures, knowledge and evaluation of several factors are necessary: the prevalence of care dependency as defined by the SGB XI, the different degrees of severity, and the utilisation of long-term care and healthcare services.In this respect, the article presents findings and calculations based on currently available administrative data from German health and long-term care insurance funds and states its limitations. In terms of an actual epidemiological approach to the topic of long-term care, the aim should be broader reporting based on primary surveys.

[Medical specialist undertreatment in nursing home residents-Prevalence and extrapolation]. / Fachärztliche Unterversorgung bei Heimbewohnern ­ Prävalenzstudie und Hochrechnung.

BACKGROUND: Nursing home residents tend to have lower medical specialist utilization than other groups of older people; however, as yet there is little evidence whether nursing home residents obtain adequate medical specialist care. This study investigated whether nursing home residents receive adequate oral health care, ophthalmological care, otorhinolaryngologist care and neurological care. The unmet needs of the nursing home population in Germany was extrapolated. MATERIAL AND METHODS: Audiometry, eye examinations and oral visual inspection were performed in 409 residents from 44 nursing homes. Medical care in the previous 12 months as well as existing diagnoses were retrieved from the nursing documentation. Teams of physicians evaluated for each resident based on all collected data if the resident obtained specialist care that was adequate to the needs. RESULTS: Between 15% and 45% of the residents with need for medical specialist care did not receive adequate specialist care. Of all residents 27% had unmet need of specialist care in at least one of the investigated medical specialties. It is projected that up to 205,000 nursing home residents in Germany do not receive adequate medical specialist care. CONCLUSION: Given a considerable proportion of nursing home residents with unmet need of specialist care, interventions should be developed that help reduce the level of unmet needs.

Claims data analysis of medical specialist utilization among nursing home residents and community-dwelling older people.

BACKGROUND: Most older people, and especially those in need of long-term care, suffer from one or more chronic diseases. Consequently, older people have an increased need of medical care, including specialist care. There is little evidence as yet whether older people with greater medical care needs obtain adequate medical care because existing studies do not sufficiently control for differences in morbidity. In this study we investigate whether differences in medical specialist utilization exist between older people with and without assessed long-term care need in line with Book XI of the German Social Code, while at the same time controlling for individual differences in morbidity. METHODS: We used data from the 11 German AOK Statutory Health and Long-term Care Insurance funds of 100,000 members aged 60 years or over. Zero-inflated Poisson regression analyses were applied to investigate whether the need for long-term care and the long-term care setting are associated with the probability and number of specialist visits. We controlled for age, gender, morbidity and mortality, residential density, and general practitioner (GP) utilization. RESULTS: Older people in need of long-term care are more likely to have no specialist visit than people without the need for long-term care. This applies to nearly all medical specialties and for both care settings. Yet, despite these differences in utilization probability the number of specialist medical care visits between older people with and without the need for long-term care is similar. CONCLUSION: Older people in need of long-term care might face access barriers to specialist care. Once a contact is established, however, utilization does not differ considerably between those who need long-term care and those who don't; this indicates the importance of securing an initial contact.

Differences in medical specialist utilization among older people in need of long-term care - results from German health claims data.

BACKGROUND: Elderly in need of long-term care tend to have worse health and have higher need of medical care than elderly without need for long-term care. Yet, characteristics associated with long-term care need can impede health care access: Higher levels of long-term care need come with physical and cognitive decline such as frailty and memory loss. Yet, it has not been investigated whether level of long-term care need is related to medical care utilization. METHODS: We investigated the association between the level of long-term care and medical specialist utilization among nursing home residents and home care recipients. We applied zero-inflated Poisson regression with robust standard errors based on a sample of statutory health insurance members. The sample consisted of 100.000 elderly over age 60. We controlled for age, gender, morbidity and mortality, residential density, and general practitioner utilization. RESULTS: We found a strong gradient effect of the level of long-term care for 9 out of 12 medical specialties: A higher level of long-term care need was associated with a lower probability of having a medical specialist visit. Yet, we did not find clear effects of the level of long-term care need on the intensity of medical specialist care. These findings were similar for both the nursing home and home care setting. CONCLUSION: The findings indicate that inequalities in medical specialist utilization exist between elderly with differing levels of long-term care need because differences in morbidity were controlled for. Elderly with higher need of long-term care might face more access barriers to specialist medical care.

[Pressure ulcer in German Nursing Homes: Quality Assessment Using Claims Data of Statutory Health and Long-Term Care Insurance]. / Qualitätsmessung mit Routinedaten im Pflegeheim am Beispiel Dekubitus.

OBJECTIVE: Although administrative data on health care in Germany are part of legal quality assurance in hospital care, they are not part of quality assessment in long-term care. However, claims data of German statutory health and long-term care insurance provide valuable information on outcome quality in nursing homes. Claims data-based quality measurement in nursing homes has hardly been researched and basic work in secondary data analysis is required. This involves the claims data linkage of both statutory health and long-term care insurance as well as new ways of operationalization for quality indicators and their risk adjustment for fair facility comparisons. Using the example of pressure ulcer (PU) occurrence in nursing homes, this study develops a claims data-based quality indicator and discusses potentials and methodological challenges. METHODS: The analysis is based on administrative data from eleven statutory health and long-term care insurance funds (AOK, 2015). The dataset covers 31% of German nursing homes. The operationalisation of PU acquired within the facility included ICD-10 diagnoses, and prescriptions on dressings. Relevance and validity of claims data on PU-specific aids were also checked in this context. Our risk adjustment strategy followed the one already established by the claims data-based QSR (Quality assurance of inpatient health-care). The Standardized Morbidity Ratio was based on logistic regression with robust standard errors. RESULTS AND CONCLUSION: In 2015, 7.2% of the nursing home residents had at least one PU incident within the facility. The outcome quality considerably varied between facilities. Overall, claims data-based measurement of PU occurrence as outcome quality indicator is feasible for inpatient long-term care and can contribute to transparency and evaluation of care in nursing homes. Information derived from an assessment of care dependency as well as within the amended legal quality assurance system for long-term care may offer new opportunities for routine data-based quality indicators in nursing homes.

Needs-based provision of medical care to nursing home residents: protocol for a mixed-methods study.

INTRODUCTION: Nursing home residents typically have greater needs for medical care than community-dwelling elderly. However, restricted cognitive abilities and limited mobility may impede their access to general practitioners and medical specialists. The provision of medical care in nursing homes may therefore be inappropriate in some areas of medical care. The purpose of this mixed-methods study is to systematically assess, evaluate and explain met and unmet medical care needs in German nursing homes and to develop solutions where medical care is found to be inappropriate. METHODS AND ANALYSIS: First, statutory health insurance claims data are analysed to identify differences in the utilisation of medical care between nursing home residents and community-dwelling elderly with and without need for long-term care. Second, the health status and medical care of 500 nursing home residents are assessed and evaluated to quantify met and unmet medical care needs. Third, qualitative expert interviews and case conferences and, fourth, quantitative analyses of linked data are used to provide structural, case-specific and generalisable explanations of inappropriate medical care among nursing home residents. Fifth, a modified Delphi study is employed to develop pilot projects aiming to improve medical care in nursing homes. ETHICS AND DISSEMINATION: This study was approved by the Ethics Committee of the University of Bremen on 23 November 2017. Research findings are disseminated through presentations at national and international conferences and publications in peer-reviewed scientific journals. TRIAL REGISTRATION NUMBER: DRKS00012383.