UQ Leads Way on Improved Hospital Care for Older People

The University of Queensland has led development of a new computerised health assessment tool that is set to improve the quality and efficiency of hospital care for frail older people.

Professor of Geriatrics, Len Gray, who headed the development of interRAI Acute Care, said the tool provided many benefits for these patients and their clinicians. It was launched today by Queensland Deputy Premier, Paul Lucas at a Brisbane conference.

“InterRAI enables more accurate patient assessments and planning of ongoing patient care, which leads to better patient outcomes and has the potential to reduce the time a patient needs to stay in hospital. It also offers a huge time saving for clinicians,“ Professor Gray said.

Improving and streamlining care for older people is particularly important due to the high percentage of the Australian population that will reach old age at around the same time – in the next 20 to 30 years.

Patient information is gathered and fed into the InterRAI Acute Care system.

This includes cognitive and physical function, as well as psychosocial conditions, such as the availability of support at home after discharge from hospital.

The system interprets that data and provides a health assessment, including severity, diagnoses (e.g. dementia), risk (e.g. of falls), and suggested interventions.

Professor Gray, with the support of Queensland Health, is currently trialling a web-based software program based on the InterRAI Acute Care system that has the capacity to provide specialist geriatric assessments to rural hospital and other community settings via the worldwide web.

UQ Faculty Communications Manager, Marlene McKendry - 0401 99 6847