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. 2022 May 17:15:5051-5060.
doi: 10.2147/IJGM.S363543. eCollection 2022.

A Pilot Study of the Effects on an Inpatient Geriatric Consultation Team on Geriatric Syndrome Patients

Song-Seng Loke  1 , Chien-Te Lee  2 , Shan Huang  3 , Chao-Tung Chen  4
Affiliations

A Pilot Study of the Effects on an Inpatient Geriatric Consultation Team on Geriatric Syndrome Patients

Song-Seng Loke et al. Int J Gen Med. .

Abstract

Purpose: To evaluate the effect of comprehensive geriatric assessment performed by an inpatient aging consultation team on older patients with geriatric syndromes.

Methods: Fifty-nine patients with ≧65 years, Barthel Index score ≦60, at least one geriatric syndrome, and admitted to non-geriatric wards were enrolled. By their preference, 16 were in the intervention group with comprehensive geriatric assessment and instructions from the consultation team. And 43 were in the control group, receiving standard care from non-geriatric-specialist physicians. Outcomes were readmission and mortality within one year after discharge.

Results: The mean age of the intervention and control groups was 78.35 (8.54) and 80.23 (6.36) years (p = 0.36), with female of 62.5% and 60.5%, respectively. Compared to control, intervention is not significantly associated with attenuated risk for readmission (adjusted hazard ratio (aHR): 0.256, 95% confidence interval (CI): 0.12-1.78, p = 0.256) and mortality (aHR: 2.13, 95% CI: 0.29-15.7, p = 0.457) within one year after discharge. Multivariate analysis showed that patients with a fall history ≧1 in the past one year had a lower risk of readmission (aHR: 0.28, 0.07-0.6, p = 0.004) or mortality (aHR: 0.11, 95% CI: 0.01-0.97, p = 0.047), and disability is associated with mortality (aHR: 5.37, 95% CI: 0.87-33.12, p = 0.07).

Conclusion: Intervention is not significantly associated with outcomes in our pilot study. But fall history ≧1 in the recent one year is associated with a lower risk of readmission and mortality among all included patients. More participants and longer follow-up are needed for better elucidation.

Keywords: comprehensive geriatric assessment; geriatric syndrome; inpatient geriatric consultation team; mortality rate; readmission rate.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declared of no competing interests in this work.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Cumulative incidence curves for 1-year read mission between intervention and control groups. (A) All patients; (B) stratified by fall history ≧1 in recent 1 year.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Cumulative incidence curves for 1-year mortality between intervention and control groups. (A) All patients; (B) stratified by fall history ≧1 in recent 1 year.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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