An overview of behaviour difficulties found in long-term elderly care settings.

STUDY OBJECTIVE

To provide an understanding of the nature and prevalence of behaviour difficulties in long-term care facilities, to compare care settings and comment on the appropriateness of the need for specialist care.

DESIGN

Nurses or carers implemented two rating scales in randomly selected settings.

SETTING

Nursing homes, residential homes and NHS elderly long-stay wards.

SUBJECTS

Elderly long-stay patients.

MAIN RESULTS

NHS and nursing home long-term care facilities show similar behaviour difficulties, with nursing homes experiencing more behaviour manifestations in most cases. Residential facilities have behaviour difficulties to a lesser extent.

CONCLUSIONS

Nursing homes have limited formal psychiatric intervention compared to NHS settings. Behaviour difficulties result in increased work for general practitioners and increased hospital referrals. More prospective research is required into the antecedents, effects and treatments of patients with behaviour difficulties in nursing homes. For example, it may be appropriate that specialist input is provided for nursing homes in order to implement behaviour intentions and contribute to the reduction of GP callouts and pharmacological interventions.