Transforming emergency services for frail older people in hospital.

Managers of emergency care, acute medicine and geriatric medicine care had a difficult few months over winter managing rising demand for emergency care, and the likelihood is that we will face similar demands in future winters unless we improve services and release capacity. The complexity of this demand is also changing with more frail older people presenting for emergency care. With this in mind, there is an urgent need to improve and streamline emergency services to meet the needs of this patient group. This article focuses on the principles that managers can employ to improve frailty services and the processes that can be adopted to develop effective frailty services in hospitals that deliver better outcomes for patients.