Hospital transition care for the elderly: an integrative review

Abstract

Objective: to identify evidence of scientific production on hospital transition care provided to the elderly. Method: an integrative review, with publications search in the MEDLINE, PubMed, LILACS, BDENF, Index Psychology and SciELO databases, with keywords and Mesh terms: elderly, hospitalization, patient discharge, health of the elderly, and transitional care, between 2013 and 2017 in English, Portuguese and Spanish. The 14 selected articles analysis was carried out through exploratory and critical reading of titles, abstracts and results of the researches. Results: transitional care can prevent re-hospitalizations as they enable rehabilitation, promotion and cure of illnesses in the elderly. Final considerations: transitional care implies the improvement of the quality of life of the elderly person, requiring skilled health professionals who involve the family through accessible communication.

Referral to the national network of integrated care: the nurses’ perception

“…In addition, associated with the insufficient number of professionals, namely physicians, they culminate in the lack of close monitoring of the patients, which leads to the demand for emergency services. The results of this study are corroborated by other authors who report that patients without a close follow-up resort to the emergency department more frequently, despite the fact that hospitalizations are not only expensive, but are also potentially harmful to the health of the older population (31)(32)(33)(34) , therefore contrasting with the recommendation of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, which estimates that 30% of the hospital activity in Portugal could be done in the community (3) .…”

“…They state that this procedure causes a delay in the patient's admission in due time due to the constraints of the UF. The constraints referred to in this study were also referred to by other studies that assess patient accessibility to the RNCCI network (28)(29)(30)(31) .…”

Transitional care to caregivers of dependent older people: an integrative literature review

“…The option of including studies that evaluated the need of caregivers in different care phases (hospitalization, hospital discharge, hospital-home transition, and the first 30 days after returning home) was justified by the recommendations that advocate that the interventions to manage the transition from hospital to home happen in three different steps: before the patient leaves hospital, during hospital discharge, and between 48 hours and 30 days after discharge (17,19) .…”

“…People admitted to hospitals are vulnerable to experiencing care continuity loss when there are alterations in their health condition or when they are transferred between care institutions (16) . This poses a remarkable challenge for health systems to guarantee the execution of a set of actions whose objective is ensuring care continuity between different care levels (17) , which helps in the process of adapting to the new care reality (15)(16)(17) . Additionally, care continuity contributes to decreasing costs and is an adequate strategy and a policy to be replicated by health services (16) .…”

“…An integrative literature review (ILR) that had the objective of identifying evidence about hospital transition care provided to older people in scientific production showed that this type of care benefits both older people with complex chronic and therapeutic conditions and their caregivers, who often become vulnerable to experiencing derangements or making mistakes when providing care because of lack of guidance. However, the study emphasized that this type of care is relatively uncommon and that a limited number of older people can benefit from its advantages (17) .…”