[Continuity of care with written information and dedicated nurses: a literature review. Part 1]

Continuity of care is one of the major challenges of contemporary care. The aim of this review is to evaluate the efficacy of written information and dedicated discharge nurses on continuity of care. A literature search was done on Medline (1966-March 2004) and Cinhal (1984-2004) with the following key words: "Community Health Nursing e Discharge Planning/Nursing Records/Continuity of Patient Care", "discharge liaison nurse", "liaison nurse", "transfer nurse" and "discharge coordinator (co-ordinator)" and "case manager nurse", a search by author was also performed. Editorials, letters and comments were excluded. Overall, 35 articles were identified. There are no evidences that written information improves the continuity of care and no agreement exists on the information to be registered: a diary of the patient hospital stay or detalied prescriptions of future interventions. A discharge professional seems to be effective on costs reduction, patients' satisfaction and according to some authors, also on the continuity of care. New and more extensive research is needed to shed a light on this pivotal aspect of care.