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Who knows best? Older people's contribution to understanding and preventing avoidable hospital admissions
- Authors:
- GLASBY Jon, et al
- Publisher:
- University of Birmingham. School of Social Policy
- Publication year:
- 2016
- Pagination:
- 64
- Place of publication:
- Birmingham
This study sets out to understand the appropriateness of hospital admission for older people, looking at the issue from different perspectives. It estimates the rate of so-called ‘inappropriate admissions’ whilst also engaging older people in a meaningful way to gather their longer-term perspective on their health and what underlay their hospital admission, together with their views about what might have been done to prevent it. Working with 104 older people and some 40 local professionals, the research looked in detail at how the older people were admitted to hospital, whether they felt this was the best place for them and what alternatives might have been explored. Similar questions were also asked of a GP and / or hospital doctor representing as many of these older people as possible. Overall, the study found that most older people were admitted to hospital appropriately. Only nine of 104 older people (almost 9%) felt that hospital was not the right place for them – and even these nine people sounded very unwell at the time of admission. None of the GPs or hospital doctors who took part felt that these (or any other) admissions in the study were ‘inappropriate’ (making a rate of ‘inappropriate’ admissions of 0% from a medical perspective). Despite the majority of older people feeling their emergency admission was appropriate, about a quarter of the older people interviewed could identify earlier action which might have prevented their admission, mainly to do with earlier intervention following previous health assessments or earlier access to their GP. The report however cautions that reducing the number of emergency admission to hospital requires complex and multi-faceted interventions, with no evidence of simple solutions. It argues that potential solutions to reducing the number of emergency admissions to hospital of older people can only be addressed by health and social care services working together in collaboration, and that further exploration of the potential role of appropriately funded adult social care services is needed. (Edited publisher abstract)