A study of appropriateness of acute geriatric admissions and an assessment of the Appropriateness Evaluation Protocol.

We studied the appropriateness of admissions to our acute geriatric unit to determine whether they were clinically indicated and to test the Appropriateness Evaluation Protocol (AEP), an instrument previously validated for general hospital admissions. An admission is appropriate according to the AEP if at least 1 of its 16 criteria is met. At the next ward round, a consultant would judge, given the clinical details available on admission, whether the admission was appropriate, regardless of the AEP. All emergency admissions during a three week period were eligible. Of 186 admissions, 146 (78.5%) were available for analysis. The rates of inappropriateness according to consultants and AEP were 13% and 11% respectively. The AEP had a sensitivity of 97%, specificity of 63%, positive and negative predictive values of 95% and 75% respectively. The overall agreement between consultants and AEP was 92% (kappa = 0.62). There are no data on the optimal level of appropriateness but our rate of 87% (89% using the AEP) appears favourable. This study also shows the AEP to be a suitable tool to monitor the appropriateness of acute geriatric admissions.