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Centre for Policy on Ageing | |
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| Non-pharmacological interventions in the prevention of delirium | | Author(s) | Naji Tabet, Robert Howard |
| Journal title | Age and Ageing, vol 38, no 4, July 2009 |
| Pages | pp 374-379 |
| Source | http://www.ageing.oxfordjournals.org |
| Keywords | Confusion ; Preventative medicine ; Psychiatric treatment ; Literature reviews. |
| Annotation | Delirium is a serious and common disorder especially among older people on inpatient units. Numerous modifiable or manageable delirium risk factors have been identified. As a result, there is now a widespread notion that many cases of delirium can be prevented. In this review, published data evaluating non-pharmacological interventions for delirium prevention were assessed in relation to their efficacy. Currently, most published studies are based on direct targeting of risk factors and/or introduction of educational programmes to increase staff knowledge and awareness. However, there continues to be a dearth of randomised controlled trials evaluating non-pharmacological interventions, partly because of the inherent difficulties associated with delirium research in general and with the evaluation of non-pharmacological interventions in particular. Instead, many of the available studies have been observational or non-randomised in nature. Nevertheless, the majority of these support a role for non-pharmacological interventions in delirium prevention. While more research is certainly needed, the majority of available data are based on best practice protocols, guidelines and interventions. Hence, a consistent and concerted effort is now justified to introduce non-pharmacological prevention strategies across units to help tackle the increasingly prevalent delirium among older people. (KJ/RH). |
| Accession Number | CPA-090728207 A |
| Classmark | EDC: LK2: LP: 64A |
Data © Centre for Policy on Ageing |
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| ...from the Ageinfo database published by Centre for Policy on Ageing. |
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