LAUSR

Patient flow, the movement of patients is an integral part of the patient care pathway. With the goal of improving overall patient care and discharge planning, a hospital wide, multidisciplinary team based, patient discharge meeting or ‘HUDDLE’ was devised with the goal of facilitating onward care planning for all inpatients especially those with complex discharge needs in a city centre teaching hospital. The patient flow huddle has evolved to include a Patient Flow Clinical Nurse Manager, Bed Manager, Medicine for Older Persons Clinical Nurse Specialist, Physiotherapist/Occupational Therapist, Consultant Geriatrician and Geriatric Medicine Registrar. Each team in the hospital are requested to attend at least twice a week. Predicted discharge dates are established. Teams discuss patients who have a requirement for rehabilitation, either short-term or complex rehabilitation and patients over 65 years who may need review from Older Persons Services .We sought to optimise issues including housing, home care packages, interim home supports, community intervention team referrals, integrated care and Nursing Home Support Scheme applications. There were 3918 Emergency Department presentations by adults over 75 in 2018 and 2113 admissions (3704, 2081 respectively in 2017). Accuracy for discharge within one day of PDD ranged from 52.5% (Jan) to 72.6 % (Nov). The average length of stay was 6.2days (SD 0.47). 172 patients (84 female, 88 male) were admitted for slow stream rehabilitation (median length of stay 30 days). Rather than using a negative view of older adults as potential ‘bed blockers’, the discharge huddle allowed a pro-active approach to assist medical and surgical teams in the management and re-enablement of patients with complex care needs. Early identification of such patients with complex care and discharge needs allowed greater focus on appropriate planning earlier in the patient’s hospital journey.