title: Mortality and morbidity rates of discharged elderly day care patients. A one-year follow-up of an experimental day care programme.
abstract: The purpose of this study was to assess possible long-term effects of a focused psychosocial complementary programme added to a 3-month day care rehabilitation programme for elderly patients. Sixty-five referred elderly patients of a day care unit were randomly allocated to an experimental or control group. The experimental group was offered the chance to participate in the psychosocial addition aimed at enhancing personal control. Perceived health, autonomy, life satisfaction and psychophysiological state were shown to benefit from the psychosocial programme during the intervention period. A one-year follow-up of the patients showed no differences in mortality rates between the experimental (2/33) and control (2/32) groups. However, significantly fewer patients were readmitted to hospital from the experimental group (13/33, compared with 21/32, p = 0.02). Length of stay in hospital was significantly shorter in the experimental group (22.1 days, compared with 61.9 days in the control group, p = 0.03). The results indicate that patients benefit not only psychologically from the psychosocial intervention programme during the treatment period, but also in a longer time perspective. This programme also resulted in a reduction in in-patient health care costs.
authors.affiliation: Clinic of Geriatrics, Dalen's Hospital, Stockholm, Sweden.
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Lökk
authors.forename: B
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Arnetz
authors.forename: T
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Theorell
mesh_terms: D000359:Aftercare; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D003631:Day Care, Medical; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009017:Morbidity; D009026:Mortality; D010359:Patient Readmission; D015397:Program Evaluation; D012046:Rehabilitation; D013548:Sweden