The use of shared medical appointments in the care of the elderly.

The shared medical appointment is a model of delivering outpatient care in which several patients interact simultaneously with 1 or several providers. These appointments were developed as an efficient means of delivering education about chronic medical conditions to elderly individuals. In several, but not all trials, chronically ill elderly and younger patients have achieved better general and disease-specific outcomes. However, because the studies have compared these appointments with conventional care, it is not clear whether advantages occur because of the unique characteristics of such an outpatient visit or because of more time spent or greater numbers of providers interacting with patients.