Older persons in acute hospitals awaiting transfer to a residential aged care facility.

摘要

Recently I had the good fortune to spend some time observing the older person health care/aged care systems of Canada, the USA and the UK. Whereas each system had parts which were of admirable quality I was also struck by the more than favourable comparison of the Australian system. For example, in the USA, health care for older people is often provided by multiple subspecialists with poor access to mul-tidisciplinary teams and rehabilitation is poorly resourced. Perverse incentives in acute medical care for older people allow gross inefficiencies producing often poor quality outcomes with excessive costs [1].