Pain is an understudied problem in geriatric medicine and especially among nursing home residents. The focus of this study was to describe the scope of the problem of pain in a long-term care facility. Ninety-seven subjects from a 311-bed multilevel teaching nursing home were interviewed, and charts were reviewed for pain problems and management strategies. Functional status, depression, and cognitive impairment were also evaluated. Results indicate that 71% of residents had at least one pain complaint (range, 1-4). Of subjects with pain, 34% described constant (continuous) pain and 66% described intermittent pain. Of 43 subjects with intermittent pain, 51% described pain on a daily basis. Major sources of pain included low back pain (40%), arthritis of appendicular joints (24%), previous fracture sites (14%), and neuropathies (11%). Moderately strong correlations were found between pain and infrequent attendance at recreational and social activities (r = .50). However, little correlation was observed between pain and the Yesavage Depression Scale, the Folstein Mini-Mental State Scale, or basic ADLs measured by the Katz Scale. Pain-management strategies consisted of analgesic drugs, physical therapy, and heating pads. Only 15% of patients with pain had received medication within the previous 24 hours. The findings suggest that pain is a major problem in long-term care. Strategies for pain management appear to be limited in scope and application in this setting. Important barriers were identified that influence the reporting and management of pain in this setting.

The 14-item geriatrics attitudes scale developed in this study shows sound reliability, validity, and sensitivity to change among primary care residents. The performance of other groups of medical trainees and the relationship of attitude changes to specific medical training warrant further investigation.

Hypothyroidism in non-demented older adults is associated with impairments in learning, word fluency, visual-spatial abilities, and some aspect of attention, visual scanning, and motor speed. The MMS by itself was sensitive in differentiating hypothyroid patients with cognitive deficits from controls, while electrophysiological measures did not generally differentiate the hypothyroid patients from normal controls. The MMS was not sensitive to treatment effects, but treatment was associated with significant improvements in three of the most sensitive measures of cognitive dysfunction.

Our study suggests that falls are a marker of underlying disorders easily identifiable by a careful postfall assessment, which in turn can reduce disability and costs.

The time required to implement the feeding assistance intervention greatly exceeded the time the nursing staff spent assisting residents in usual mealtime care conditions. These data suggest that it will almost certainly be necessary to both increase staffing levels and to organize staff better to produce higher quality feeding assistance during mealtimes.