Elder-friendly Approaches to the Surgical Environment (EASE) Study

University of Alberta

Status

Completed

Conditions

General Surgery

Treatments

Other: Elder-Friendly Surgical Unit

Study type

Observational

Funder types

Other

Identifiers

NCT02233153

Pro00047180

Details and patient eligibility

About

The aim of this study is to examine the impact implementing an elder-friendly surgical unit has on post-operative complications, mortality and quality of life for patients ≥ 65 years old who have undergone emergency surgical care.

Full description

The investigators hypothesize that the elder-friendly surgical unit will reduce in-hospital complications and mortality in a cost-effective manner, for this at risk population.

Specific elder-friendly interventions include:

Locate all elderly surgical patients on one nursing unit
Interdisciplinary team-based care
Elder-friendly evidence-informed practices including: comfort rounds with early mobilization, delirium prevention/management, optimal nutrition and prevention of post-operative complications
Early and interdisciplinary discharge management

This is a prospective, before-after study with a concurrent control group. Four senior patient groups will be followed:

Enrollment

723 patients

Sex

All

Ages

65+ years old

Volunteers

No Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

All patients > 65 years old admitted for Acute care and Emergency Surgery
Received acute abdominal surgery

Exclusion criteria

Elective general surgery cases
Nursing home resident requiring full nursing care [dependency in 3 or more activities of daily living ]
Palliative surgery [surgery with the primary intention of improving quality of life or relieving symptoms caused by advancing non-curative disease]
Multi-system trauma
Patients from out of province or transferred from another inpatient service or hospital