A short report on point prevalence of delirium in hospitalised older adult patients in Auckland, New Zealand

Journal Title: Journal of Geriatric Care and Research - Year 2019, Vol 6, Issue 1

Abstract

Background: Delirium in hospitalised older persons is common and is correlated with adverse outcomes. Few studies of this have been done in New Zealand. This study aimed to measure prevalence of delirium in older adults indifferent specialities in two different hospitals. Objective: The aim of the study was to find out point prevalence of delirium in older adults in hospital setting. Methods: The subjects (n=1024) were older inpatients (>65 years; >55years if of Maori descent) surveyed over a period of 18 months. Delirium was screened for using the Confusion Assessment Method (CAM) Diagnostic algorithm. We evaluated for delirium following a detailed review of the presenting history, Mini Mental state examination (MMSE), digit span test and CAM evaluation. Results: Overall prevalence of delirium was 7.84% in older adult patients (N 1045). There was no difference in delirium among genders (p=0.24). Prevalence of delirium in older patients from medical wards was 8.7%, surgical wards were 7.5% and in rehabilitation wards were 7.7%. The average MMSE score was 24.2 (SD 5.0), the average CAM score for positive patients was 18.8 (SD 4.6). Average Memorial Delirium Assessment Scale score indicating severity of delirium was 13.13 (SD 4.8). Conclusion: Delirium remains an important diagnosis which should be considered among hospitalized older patients. Results suggested a lower prevalence of delirium in our group of patients. Results of the study are discussed with relevance to its generalizability in various settings.

Authors and Affiliations

John Scott, Sachin Jauhari, Gavin Pilkington, Brett Vykopal, Raghavakurup Radhakrishnan

Keywords

Related Articles

Recovering Quality of Life (ReQoL) scale: linguistic validation in Malayalam, an Indian language

Recovering Quality of Life (ReQoL) is a self-reported measure of quality of life of people with mental illness, with a potential for use as a patient rated outcome measure. ReQoL in English has been designed and validate...

Proposal for the empowerment of interdependent self management support for people with dementia

The concept of ‘living well’ varies among individuals, and such diversity should be valued. However, maintaining co-beneficial relationships is critical for all the persons with dementia to live well with dementia, since...

Care facilities for elderly people in Odisha

Like most parts of the world, there is growing concern about the care perspectives of an ever increasing population of elderly in India.1 While progress is visible in the health care sector in general, however it is most...

Recovering Quality of Life (ReQoL) scale: translation and linguistic validation in Odia

The article describes the process of translation and linguistic validation of Recovering Quality of Life (ReQoL) scale in Odia an eastern Indian language. While there are a few generic quality of life measures for use in...

A systematic review of anxiety disorders among older adults: focus on treatment of generalized anxiety disorder

Background: Anxiety disorders typically have insidious onset that begin early in life with relatively few people (<1%) developing an anxiety disorder for the first time after the age of 65 years. However, anxiety disorde...

Download PDF file
  • EP ID EP552312
  • DOI -
  • Views 64
  • Downloads 0

How To Cite

John Scott, Sachin Jauhari, Gavin Pilkington, Brett Vykopal, Raghavakurup Radhakrishnan (2019). A short report on point prevalence of delirium in hospitalised older adult patients in Auckland, New Zealand. Journal of Geriatric Care and Research, 6(1), 9-14. https://www.europub.co.uk/articles/-A-552312