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Measuring continuity of elders' posthospital care
M J Bull1, D Luo, G M Maruyama
1University of Maryland, School of Nursing, Department of Community Health and Psychiatric Nursing, Baltimore 21201-1545, USA.
Journal of Nursing Measurement
|October 12, 2000
Summary
Developing a new tool helps measure continuity of care for elders with chronic illnesses, involving patients and caregivers. This enhances quality patient care assessment post-hospitalization.
Area of Science:
- Gerontology
- Health Services Research
- Patient Care Quality
Background:
- Continuity of care is vital for quality patient outcomes.
- Existing measures for continuity of care are often unreliable or invalid.
- Assessing continuity of care is challenging, especially for elders with chronic conditions.
Purpose of the Study:
- To develop and validate an instrument for measuring continuity of care.
- To incorporate the perspectives of elderly patients and their family caregivers.
- To assess continuity during post-hospital transitions for elders with chronic illnesses.
Main Methods:
- Instrument development incorporating elder and caregiver perspectives.
- Reliability and validity testing of the instrument in multiple studies.
- Longitudinal assessment of care continuity in elders aged 55-94.
Main Results:
- The developed instrument demonstrated content and construct validity.
- Internal consistency reliability was confirmed for care management and services subscales.
- The instrument showed sensitivity to change over time in the same subjects.
Conclusions:
- The new instrument effectively measures continuity of care from elder and caregiver viewpoints.
- The care management and services subscales are reliable and valid for assessing continuity.
- Further refinement of provider continuity and conflicting information subscales is recommended for comprehensive assessment.