Delirium and transition to a nursing home of hospitalized older adults: a controlled trial of assessing the interdisciplinary team-based "geriatric" care and care coordination by non-geriatrics specialist physicians

Abstract

Aim: To examine whether a team-based inpatient "geriatric" care model provided by non-geriatrics specialist physicians was associated with changes in the occurrence of delirium and transition to a nursing home.

Methods: We carried out an intervention (interdisciplinary; ITD group) control (usual care group) study comparing the outcomes of hospitalized older adults cared for by non-geriatrics specialist physicians. Compared with the usual care group, the ITD intervention group provided additional value: geriatric care and care coordination by leading daily ITD team meetings.

Results: After adjusting for patient demographics and clinical characteristics, the probability of transition to a nursing home in the ITD intervention group was significantly lower (odds ratio 0.52; 95% confidence intervals, 0.16-0.94; P = 0.008) than that in the usual care group. However, there was no significant difference in the predicted probabilities of delirium between the ITD intervention and usual care groups.

Conclusion: As compared with the usual care group, a significantly lower probability of transition to a nursing home was observed in the ITD intervention group, but the probabilities of delirium between the ITD intervention and usual care groups did not differ significantly.