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Background: Acutely ill and frail older adults and their next of kin are often poorly involved in treatment and care decisions. This may lead to either over- or undertreatment and unnecessary burdens. The aim of this project is to improve user involvement and health services for frail older adults living at home, and their relatives, by implementing advance care planning (ACP) in selected hospital wards, and to evaluate the clinical and the implementation interventions. Methods: This is a cluster randomized trial with 12 hospital units. The intervention arm receives implementation support for 18 months; control units receive the same support afterwards. The ACP intervention consists of 1. Clinical intervention: ACP; 2. Implementation interventions: Implementation team, ACP coordinator, network meetings, training and supervision for health care personnel, documentation tools and other resources, and fidelity measurements with tailored feedback; 3. Implementation strategies: leadership commitment, whole ward approach and responsive evaluation. Fidelity will be measured three times in the intervention arm and twice in the control arm. Here, the primary outcome is the difference in fidelity changes between the arms. We will also include 420 geriatric patients with one close relative and an attending clinician in a triadic sub-study. Here, the primary outcomes are quality of communication and decision-making when approaching the end of life as perceived by patients and next of kin, and congruence between the patient's preferences for information and involvement and the clinician's perceptions of the same. For patients we will also collect clinical data and health register data. Additionally, all clinical staff in both arms will be invited to answer a questionnaire before and during the implementation period. To explore barriers and facilitators and further explore the significance of ACP, qualitative interviews will be performed in the intervention units with patients, next of kin, health care personnel and implementation teams, and with other stakeholders up to national level. Lastly, we will evaluate resource utilization, costs and health outcomes in a cost-effectiveness analysis. Discussion: The project may contribute to improved implementation of ACP as well as valuable knowledge and methodological developments in the scientific fields of ACP, health service research and implementation science. Trial registration: ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier NCT05681585. Registered 03.01.23. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Frail residents in the nursing home sector call for extra care in prescribing. The Norwegian General Practice Nursing Home (NORGEP-NH) list of 34 explicit criteria for potentially inappropriate medication use in nursing homes was developed explicitly for this population. The aim of this study was to employ the NORGEP-NH Criteria to study the extent of potentially inappropriate medication use among nursing home residents and explore possible associated factors.Methods: Cross-sectional observational pharmacoepidemiological study from residents in nursing homes in the county of Vestfold, Norway. Data collected 2009-11 included residents' demographic and clinical status and all medications, regular and on demand.Results: 881 patients from 30 institutions (mean 85.9 years, 68.6% female), were included. According to NORGEP-NH, 43.8% were prescribed at least one potentially inappropriate regular medication, and 9.9% regularly received three or more potentially inappropriate medications. When also including a) the NORGEP-NH Deprescribing Criteria and b) including drugs prescribed for use as needed, 92.7% of all residents received medication that needs particular surveillance according to the NORGEP-NH. 69.7% of the nursing home residents used at least one psychotropic drug regularly. Female residents received more often than males at least one potentially inappropriate regular medication (OR 1.60, p=0.007). Regarding the prescription of three or more concomitant psychotropic medications, odds ratio for females was 1.79 (p=0.03) compared to males. Residents with the best performance in activities of daily living, and residents residing in long-term wards, had higher risk of using three or more psychotropic drugs. Use of multiple psychoactive drugs increased the risk of falls in the course of an acute episode of infection or dehydration (odds ratio 1.70, p=0.009).Conclusions: Prevalence of potentially inappropriate medications in nursing homes according to the NORGEP-NH was extensive, and especially the use of multiple psychotropic drugs. The high prevalence found in this study shows that there is a need for higher awareness of medication use and side effects in the elderly population.Trial Registration: Retrospectively registered. Data obtained from clinical trial NCT01023763 registered with ClinicalTrials.gov 12/01/2009. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Ethically challenging critical events and decisions are common in nursing homes. This paper presents nursing home doctors' descriptions of how they include the patient and next of kin in end-of-life decisions.Methods: We performed ten focus groups with 30 nursing home doctors. Advance care planning; aspects of decisions on life-prolonging treatment, and conflict with next of kin were subject to in-depth analysis and condensation.Results: The doctors described large variations in attitudes and practices in all aspects of end-of-life decisions. In conflict situations, many doctors were more concerned about the opinion of next of kin than ensuring the patient's best interest.Conclusions: Many end-of-life decisions appear arbitrary or influenced by factors independent of the individual patient's values and interests and are not based on systematic ethical reflections. To protect patient autonomy in nursing homes, stronger emphasis on legal and ethical knowledge among nursing home doctors is needed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Antibiotic resistance is a problem in nursing homes. Presumed urinary tract infections (UTI) are the most common infection. This study examines urine culture results from elderly patients to see if specific guidelines based on gender or whether the patient resides in a nursing home (NH) are warranted. Methods: This is a cross sectional observation study comparing urine cultures from NH patients with urine cultures from patients in the same age group living in the community. Results: There were 232 positive urine cultures in the NH group and 3554 in the community group. Escherichia coli was isolated in 145 urines in the NH group (64%) and 2275 (64%) in the community group. There were no clinically significant differences in resistance. Combined, there were 3016 positive urine cultures from females and 770 from males. Escherichia coli was significantly more common in females 2120 (70%) than in males 303 (39%)(p < 0.05). Enterococcus faecalis was significantly less common in females 223(7%) than males 137 (18%) (p < 0.05). For females, there were lower resistance rates to ciprofloxacin among Escherichia coli (7% vs 12%; p < 0.05) and to mecillinam among Proteus mirabilis (3% vs 12%; p < 0.05). Conclusions: Differences in resistance rates for patients in the nursing home do not warrant separate recommendations for empiric antibiotic therapy, but recommendations based on gender seem warranted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]