AIM: To understand the perceived factors that shape decision-making around the time of residential care admission in older people. METHOD: Two qualitative methods (telephone interviews at intervals post discharge from geriatric inpatient care and face-to-face interviews with older people and their family carers) were used as part of a multiphase mixed methods study of a cohort of 144 older people discharged from medical wards in a subacute assessment, treatment and rehabilitation facility. RESULTS: Key topics and themes were derived from interviews: the role of the informal carer and other community supports, attitudes to decision-making and loneliness were key aspects of social context. Physical health, the experience of repeated hospital admissions and health professionals' attitudes to repeated admissions were also seen as important. CONCLUSIONS: Social context as an essential component of older people's decisions to enter aged residential care is highlighted in this qualitative study.
AIM: To understand the perceived factors that shape decision-making around the time of residential care admission in older people. METHOD: Two qualitative methods (telephone interviews at intervals post discharge from geriatric inpatient care and face-to-face interviews with older people and their family carers) were used as part of a multiphase mixed methods study of a cohort of 144 older people discharged from medical wards in a subacute assessment, treatment and rehabilitation facility. RESULTS: Key topics and themes were derived from interviews: the role of the informal carer and other community supports, attitudes to decision-making and loneliness were key aspects of social context. Physical health, the experience of repeated hospital admissions and health professionals' attitudes to repeated admissions were also seen as important. CONCLUSIONS: Social context as an essential component of older people's decisions to enter aged residential care is highlighted in this qualitative study.
Authors: Barbara Caecilia Wimmer; Elsa Dent; Renuka Visvanathan; Michael David Wiese; Kristina Johnell; Ian Chapman; J Simon Bell Journal: Drugs Aging Date: 2014-08 Impact factor: 3.923