Creating New Opportunities to Educate Families on the Impact of Frailty and Cognitive Impairment in a Trauma Intensive Care Unit: Results of a Quality Improvement Project

摘要

Background: Older adults comprise a rapidly growing proportion of admissions to acute care hospitals and trauma centers. Older adults admitted to a trauma intensive care unit (TICU) often have a more complicated inpatient and posthospital course. This is the most pronounced in frail elders with cognitive dysfunction. We aimed at integrating validated screening instruments for physical frailty and cognitive impairment into the standard nursing assessment of all older trauma patients admitted to our TICU and stepdown unit.