Older Persons’ Transitions in Care

The purpose of this program of research is to improve care for frail elderly people in nursing homes and secondarily, to reduce the burden of elderly patients on emergency department resources and to give decision makers tools to identify potentially modifiable elements to improve the quality of care of residents who move between nursing homes and emergency departments.

The purpose of this program of research is to improve care for frail elderly people in nursing homes and secondarily, to reduce the burden of elderly patients on emergency department resources and to give decision makers tools to identify potentially modifiable elements to improve the quality of care of residents who move between nursing homes and emergency departments. Using an integrated knowledge translation (KT) approach, the objectives are to:

1. Define the multiple perspectives of successful and unsuccessful transitions, and develop and test a practical tool to assess transition success, in terms of quality of care and avoidable complications;
2. Assess transition processes in a discreet set of transitions in two study sites over a one year period;
3. Analyze the influence of organizational factors in key practice locations, e.g. NHs, pre-hospital transport services, and emergency departments, on transition successfulness in two study sites; and
4. Identify opportunities for evidence-informed management and quality improvement.

The study will take place in Edmonton, Alberta and Kelowna, British Columbia. It will involve the University of Alberta and Kelowna General Hospital emergency departments and the nursing homes from which they receive residents.