Confirming long-stay status

This paper discusses an assessment procedure for the formal identification of patients requiring long-stay geriatric care. It was introduced immediately prior to the reorganization of geriatric in-patient care at St Pancras Hospital which saw the abolition of mixed wards of acute, rehabilitation, and long-stay patients and their replacement by six specialized wards, three of which are long-stay wards accommodating 51 patients. The formal assessment and referral for long-stay care is itself one outcome of deliberations made by a multidisciplinary panel formed a few months before the hospital reorganization to examine the kind of care and environment that might best enable the long-stay elderly to enjoy, within the limits of their disabilities, as dignified and worthwhile lives as possible. The paper begins by outlining the reasons why an assessment procedure came to be seen as a necessary and important element in the new system of continuing care of geriatric patients. This is followed by a brief consideration of how the procedure operates. An example of the assessment form is included.