Mobile emergency department care to nursing home residents: a novel outreach service.
Age Ageing
; 52(3)2023 03 01.
Article
em En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-36861182
ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND:
Every month, 6% of Danish nursing home residents are admitted to hospital. However, these admissions might have limited benefits and are associated with an increased risk of complications. We initiated a new mobile service comprising consultants performing emergency care in nursing homes.OBJECTIVE:
Describe the new service, the recipients of this service, hospital admission patterns and 90-day mortality.DESIGN:
A descriptive observational study. MODEL When an ambulance is requested to a nursing home, the emergency medical dispatch centre simultaneously dispatches a consultant from the emergency department who will provide an emergency evaluation and decisions regarding treatment at the scene in collaboration with municipal acute care nurses.METHOD:
We describe the characteristics of all nursing home contacts from 1st November 2020 to 31st December 2021. The outcome measures were hospital admissions and 90-day mortality. Data were extracted from the patients' electronic hospital records and prospectively registered data.RESULTS:
We identified 638 contacts (495 individuals). The new service had a median of two (interquartile range 2-3) new contacts per day. The most frequent diagnoses were related to infections, unspecific symptoms, falls, trauma and neurologic disease. Seven out of eight residents remained at home following treatment, 20% had an unplanned hospital admission within 30 days and 90-day mortality was 36.4%.CONCLUSION:
Transitioning emergency care from hospitals to nursing homes could present an opportunity for providing optimised care to a vulnerable population and limiting unnecessary transfers and admissions to hospitals.Palavras-chave
Texto completo:
1
Coleções:
01-internacional
Base de dados:
MEDLINE
Assunto principal:
Ambulâncias
/
Serviços Médicos de Emergência
Tipo de estudo:
Observational_studies
/
Prognostic_studies
Limite:
Humans
Idioma:
En
Revista:
Age Ageing
Ano de publicação:
2023
Tipo de documento:
Article
País de afiliação:
Dinamarca