Delirium Screening of the Elderly in the Emergency Department

Status unconfirmed · Not applicable

Conditions studied: Delirium

In brief

This study will refine and pilot test an innovative, emergency department (ED)-based intervention for delirium screening, initial management, and communication with inpatient providers, and examine the impact of this intervention on the rate of documentation of delirium in the electronic health record by ED and inpatient providers. To achieve this, the study will develop and pilot test an intervention, Delirium Screening (SCREEN-ED) in the ED, involving 300 older patients (150 newly enrolled intervention participants, 150 historical controls (comparison group) currently being collected), that has 4 key components: systematic screening for delirium using the Confusion Assessment Method (CAM), informing providers of the screening result, a checklist protocol for initial delirium management based on clinical guidelines, and documentation in the Electronic Health Record (EHR) and communication with inpatient providers of delirium screening results. The study has two primary aims. The first is to refine and test the feasibility and acceptability of the SCREEN-ED intervention. The second is to examine the impact of SCREEN-ED on rate of delirium documentation and secondary outcomes (length of hospital stay, repeat ED visits and hospitalizations and mortality over 6-months) in the 150 newly enrolled intervention group compared with 150 already collected historical controls.

Key facts

Study ID

NCT02801851

Run by

Northeastern University

People needed

150

Starts

2015-07-01

Expected to finish

2017-06-01

Last updated by the study team

2016-07-19

Who can join

Age: 65 and older. Sex: any. Healthy volunteers: not accepted.

You may qualify if…

• 65 years presenting to the ED between 2pm and 11pm (highest ED census) 7 days a week

You may not qualify if…

• Patients who are being evaluated for severe head injury and those who present with delirium tremens due to the difficulty of distinguishing delirium from head injury and because delirium tremens has a distinct etiology, course and outcomes.
• Patients who are aphasic, comatose, terminally ill, deaf, or are non-English speaking.

Where it is running

• UMass Medical School — Worcester, Massachusetts, United States (enrolling)

Full record on ClinicalTrials.gov

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