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A. McDermott1, G. Kerr1, J. Browne1
1St. James's Hospital, Dublin, Ireland
Background: Older frail individuals are at risk of prolonged hospital stays which can lead to negative health outcomes such as falls, infection and reduced independence. Recent evidence suggests that frailty, as measured using the clinical frailty scale, may be associated with longer sub-acute hospital stays. Recently, St. James's Hospital Dublin, opened a sub-acute complex discharge unit (CDU) which aims to reduce the length of hospital stay in older individuals by providing optimal inter-disciplinary team discharge planning. This study aimed see whether frailty assessed by a physiotherapist, using the clinical frailty scale, was associated with length of sub-acute hospital stay.
Purpose: The purpose of this study was to investigate whether frailty, assessed using the clinical frailty scale by a physiotherapist, was associated with prolonged sub-acute hospital stay.
Methods: 104 patients admitted to the CDU over a 6 month period were invited to participate in the study. Grip strength, timed up and go score (TUAG) and clinical frailty scale (CFS) rating were recorded for all participants. Demographic information such as reason for hospital admission, length of stay (LOS) and discharge destination was recorded.
Results: 104 participants took part in the study (mean age 79.9 ± 10.0 years) and the average LOS was 22.3 ± 21.8 days. There was a significant positive correlation between TUAG and LOS (r = 0.22 p < 0.04) and CFS and LOS (r = 0.29, p < 0.004) while regression analysis of the data revealed that only CFS was a significant predictor of LOS (r = 0.44, p <0.05).
Conclusion(s): The CFS is a useful clinical tool for identifying older individuals who may be at risk of a prolonged sub-acute hospital stay.
Implications: The results of this study show that the physiotherapist is ideally placed in the sub-acute hospital setting to identify those who may be at risk of prolonged hospital stay.
Funding, acknowledgements: This study received no funding
Keywords: Frailty, Length of stay, Discharge Planning
Topic: Older people
Did this work require ethics approval? Yes
Institution: St. James's Hospital, Dublin, Ireland
Committee: Joint ethics committee of SJH/TUH
Ethics number: 2019-04 Chairman’s Action (15)
All authors, affiliations and abstracts have been published as submitted.
