Continuity of care on admission to hospital: an audit of Airedale NHS Trust's transfer policy.

Describes an audit of interprofession communications among hospital, community health and social services concerning hospital admission. Information from 150 patient admissions (50 from each of three general practices after a target date) was gathered from both community and hospital sources. The results were used to audit the transfer policy operated by Airedale NHS Trust. The audit design incorporated an element of research, the results of which were used to inform the interpretation of the audit results and to suggest appropriate recommendations for change. Recommendations included the introduction of a pre-admissions checklist, specific changes to the nursing documentation, measures to improve the speed of information transfer, and the clarification of responsibilities for initiating contact across the hospital-community interface when patients with existing contacts in community services are admitted to hospital. Concludes that the introduction of supplementary research to an otherwise traditional audit cycle strengthened the resulting recommendations.