scholarly journals Diabetes, Care Homes, and the Influence of Technology on Practice and Care Delivery in Care Homes: Systematic Review and Qualitative Synthesis (Preprint)

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rebecca Mathews ◽  
Chris O'Malley ◽  
Jenny M Hall ◽  
Leah Macaden ◽  
Sandra MacRury

BACKGROUND Diabetes is increasing in prevalence and complexity in the care home setting, affecting up to a quarter of care home residents. Health outcomes for these residents are impacted by management of the disease, health care professionals (HCPs)’ decision-making skills within the care home setting, and access to specialist services. The use of technology has the potential to recognize opportunities for early intervention that enables efficient responsive care, taking a fundamental role in linking the care home community to wider multidisciplinary teams for support. OBJECTIVE The aim of this paper was to identify evidence that explores factors relevant to the use of technology in and around the care home setting to aid in the management of diabetes. METHODS Databases searched using a structured prespecified approach included: PubMed, CINAHL (Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature), OVID Nursing database, Scopus, MEDLINE, the Cochrane Library, and the King’s Fund from 2012 to 2017: handsearching was undertaken additionally for any gray literature. Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic review and Meta-Analysis Protocol was used as protocol with Risk of Bias in Systematic reviews a tool to assess the risk of bias across studies. Studies had to include interventions that combined technology to or from the care home setting to support residents living with diabetes. RESULTS The combined search strategy identified a total of 493 electronic records. Of these, 171 papers were screened for eligibility, 66 full papers were accessed, and 13 have been included in this study. Qualitative synthesis has identified different strands of research evidence in what and how technology is currently being used in and around care homes to enhance diabetes management. New initiatives and implementations of technology and emerging models of care that included the use of technology have also been included. CONCLUSIONS By triangulating the perspectives of HCPs, practitioners, specialists, and members of the care home community, the authors anticipate that this review will represent an up-to-date, evidence-based overview of the potential for using technology within the care home setting for diabetes management as well as stimulate research in this area.

2019 ◽  
pp. bmjspcare-2018-001680
Author(s):  
Aoife Gleeson ◽  
Simon Noble ◽  
Mala Mann

Background Advance care planning (ACP) is a process where patients express their wishes regarding their future healthcare. Its importance has been increasingly recognised in the past decade. As increasing numbers of elderly people are living in care homes, the aim of this review was to identify the most effective ACP interventions to train/educate all levels of healthcare professionals working in care homes. Design A systematic review. Two independent reviewers undertook screening, data extraction and quality assessment. Data sources  Searched from inception to June 2018: Ovid Medline, Ovid Medline in process, Ovid Embase, Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials, EBSCO Cinahl and Ovid PsycINFO. Results Six studies were included: three before and after studies, one cluster randomised controlled trial (RCT), one non-blinded RCT and one qualitative study. Five studies reported on ACP documentation, three on impact on ACP practice and three studies on healthcare-related outcomes. All quantitative studies reported an improvement in outcomes. In the three studies reporting on health-related outcomes, one showed significant reductions in hospitalisation rate, days and healthcare costs; one reported significant reductions in hospital deaths; and the third showed reductions in hospital days and deaths. A meta-analysis could not be performed due to the heterogeneity of the outcome measures. The included qualitative study highlighted perceived challenges to implementing an educational programme in the care home setting. Conclusion There is limited evidence for the effectiveness of ACP training for care home workers. More well-designed studies are needed. Trial registration number CRD42016042385.


2021 ◽  
Vol 38 (9) ◽  
pp. A6.2-A6
Author(s):  
Despina Laparidou ◽  
Ffion Curtis ◽  
Withanage Iresha Udayangani Jayawickrama ◽  
Dedunu Weligamage ◽  
Marishona Ortega ◽  
...  

BackgroundMedical emergencies in care homes, both residential and nursing care homes, are common and costly, often resulting in calls to an out-of-hours general practitioner (GP) or Emergency Medical Services (EMS). Ambulance attendance frequently results in conveyance to hospital and the concomitant high costs and risks of, often prolonged, hospitalisation. Previous reviews have focussed on various stakeholder perceptions of transfer to hospital. The aim of this systematic review was to provide a comprehensive synthesis of the perceptions and experiences of care home residents and their family members, who have experienced medical emergencies in a care home setting.MethodsWe searched five electronic databases, supplemented with internet searches and forward and backward citation tracking from the included studies and review articles. Data were synthesised thematically following the Thomas and Harden approach. The CASP Qualitative Checklist was used to assess the quality of the included studies of this review.ResultsThe search strategy identified 6,140 citations. After removing duplicates and excluding citations based on title and abstract, and full-text screening, ten studies from four countries (Australia, Canada, UK, and US) were included in the review and meta-synthesis. All included studies were considered of acceptable quality. Through an iterative approach, we developed six analytical themes. 1. Infrastructure and process requirements in care homes to prevent and address emergencies; 2. The decision to transfer to hospital – a perfect storm; 3. Challenges of transfer and hospitalisation for older patients; 4. Good communication vital for desirable outcomes; 5. Legal, regulatory and ethical concerns; and 6. Trusting relationships enabled residents to feel safe.ConclusionsThe emergency care experience for care home residents can be enhanced by ensuring resources, staff capacity and processes for high quality care. Building trusting relationships underpinned by good communication and attention to ethical practice were also identified as important factors.


Author(s):  
José Afonso ◽  
Israel Teoldo da Costa ◽  
Miguel Camões ◽  
Ana Silva ◽  
Ricardo Franco Lima ◽  
...  

AbstractThe goal of this systematic review was to evaluate the effects of exercise programs using agility ladders and to assess the quality of available evidence. Search was conducted in October of 2019 using the following databases: Cochrane Library, PEDro, PubMed, Scopus and Web of Science. Study eligibility criteria included randomized trials or randomized controlled trials using agility ladders drills. Participants were healthy humans of any health status. The study appraisal and synthesis methods followed the revised Cochrane risk-of-bias tool for randomized trials (RoB 2) and a qualitative synthesis of the main results of each study were applied. Only five studies met our criteria, lasting between 4 and 8 weeks. Only two studies evaluated the effects of ladder drills on more than one dimension. Lack of description of the specific exercises that were used limits reproducibility of current studies. With one exception, the articles had low risk of bias for most domains. Despite the widespread popularity of agility ladder drills, research is scarce and problematic, with poorly described protocols and mostly unidimensional performance measures. Claims that agility ladders improve agility and other physical skills is premature, given the nature and quality of existing research.


2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (Supplement_1) ◽  
pp. 401-401
Author(s):  
Yue-Heng Yin ◽  
Liu Yat Justina

Abstract Obesity has been shown to intensify the decline of physical function and lead to frailty. Nutrition is an important method in managing obesity and frailty, while seldom reviews have ever explored the effects of nutritional education interventions. We conducted a systematic review (PROSPERO: CRD42019142403) to explore the effectiveness of nutritional education interventions in managing body composition and physio-psychosocial parameters related to frailty. Randomized controlled trials and quasi-experimental studies were searched in CINAHL, Cochrane Library, EMBASE, MEDLINE, PsycINFO, PubMed and Scopus from 2001 to 2019. Hand search for the reference lists of included papers was conducted as well. We assessed the quality of included studies by Cochrane risk of bias tool. Meta-analyses and narrative synthesis were used to analyse the data. Two studies with low risk of bias were screened from 180 articles, which involved 177 older people with an average age of 69.69±4.08 years old. The results showed that nutritional education was significantly effective in reducing body weight and fat mass than exercises, and it was beneficial to enhancing physical function and psychosocial well-being. But the effects of nutritional education in increasing muscle strength were not better than exercises. The combined effects of nutritional education and exercises were superior than either exercises or nutritional education interventions solely in preventing the loss of lean mass and bone marrow density, and in improving physical function. Due to limited numbers of relevant studies, the strong evidence of effectiveness of nutritional education interventions on reversing frailty is still lacking.


2021 ◽  
pp. 030157422110195
Author(s):  
Ashish Agrawal ◽  
TM Chou

Introduction: The objective of this systematic review is to assess the effect of vibrational force on biomarkers for orthodontic tooth movement. Methods: An electronic search was conducted for relevant studies (up to December 31, 2020) on the following databases: Pubmed, Google scholar, Web of Science, Cochrane Library, Wiley Library, and ProQuest Dissertation Abstracts and Thesis database. Hand searching of selected orthodontic journals was also undertaken. The selected studies were assessed for the risk of bias in Cochrane collaboration risk of bias tool. The “traffic plot” and “weighted plot” risk of bias distribution are designed in the RoB 2 tool. The 2 authors extracted the data and analyzed it. Results: Six studies fulfilled the inclusion criteria. The risks of biases were high for 4, low and some concern for other 2 studies. The biomarkers, medium, device, frequency and duration of device, as well as other data were extracted. The outcomes of the studies were found to be heterogenous. Conclusion: One study showed highly statistically significant levels of IL-1 beta with <.001. Rate of tooth movement was correlated with levels of released biomarkers under the influence of vibrational force in 3 studies, but it was found to be significant only in 1 study. It was further observed that vibration does not have any significant reduction in pain and discomfort.


BMJ Open ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. e040997
Author(s):  
Varo Kirthi ◽  
Paul Nderitu ◽  
Uazman Alam ◽  
Jennifer Evans ◽  
Sarah Nevitt ◽  
...  

IntroductionThere is growing evidence of a higher than expected prevalence of retinopathy in prediabetes. This paper presents the protocol of a systematic review and meta-analysis of retinopathy in prediabetes. The aim of the review is to estimate the prevalence of retinopathy in prediabetes and to summarise the current data.Methods and analysisThis protocol is developed in accordance with the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses Protocols (PRISMA-P) guidelines. A comprehensive electronic bibliographic search will be conducted in MEDLINE, EMBASE, Web of Science, Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature (CINAHL), Google Scholar and the Cochrane Library. Eligible studies will report prevalence data for retinopathy on fundus photography in adults with prediabetes. No time restrictions will be placed on the date of publication. Screening for eligible studies and data extraction will be conducted by two reviewers independently, using predefined inclusion criteria and prepiloted data extraction forms. Disagreements between the reviewers will be resolved by discussion, and if required, a third (senior) reviewer will arbitrate.The primary outcome is the prevalence of any standard features of diabetic retinopathy (DR) on fundus photography, as per International Clinical Diabetic Retinopathy Severity Scale (ICDRSS) classification. Secondary outcomes are the prevalence of (1) any retinal microvascular abnormalities on fundus photography that are not standard features of DR as per ICDRSS classification and (2) any macular microvascular abnormalities on fundus photography, including but not limited to the presence of macular exudates, microaneurysms and haemorrhages. Risk of bias for included studies will be assessed using a validated risk of bias tool for prevalence studies. Pooled estimates for the prespecified outcomes of interest will be calculated using random effects meta-analytic techniques. Heterogeneity will be assessed using the I2 statistic.Ethics and disseminationEthical approval is not required as this is a protocol for a systematic review and no primary data are to be collected. Findings will be disseminated through peer-reviewed publications and presentations at national and international meetings including Diabetes UK, European Association for the Study of Diabetes, American Diabetes Association and International Diabetes Federation conferences.PROSPERO registration numberCRD42020184820.


Author(s):  
Antonio Jose Martin-Perez ◽  
María Fernández-González ◽  
Paula Postigo-Martin ◽  
Marc Sampedro Pilegaard ◽  
Carolina Fernández-Lao ◽  
...  

There is no systematic review that has identified existing studies evaluating the pharmacological and non-pharmacological intervention for pain management in patients with bone metastasis. To fill this gap in the literature, this systematic review with meta-analysis aims to evaluate the effectiveness of different antalgic therapies (pharmacological and non-pharmacological) in the improvement of pain of these patients. To this end, this protocol has been written according to the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic review and Meta-Analysis Protocols (PRISMA-P) and registered in PROSPERO (CRD42020135762). A systematic search will be carried out in four international databases: Medline (Via PubMed), Web of Science, Cochrane Library and SCOPUS, to select the randomized controlled clinical trials. The Risk of Bias Tool developed by Cochrane will be used to assess the risk of bias and the quality of the identified studies. A narrative synthesis will be used to describe and compare the studies, and after the data extraction, random effects model and a subgroup analyses will be performed according to the type of intervention, if possible. This protocol aims to generate a systematic review that compiles and synthesizes the best and most recent evidence on the treatment of pain derived from vertebral metastasis.


Medicina ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 57 (6) ◽  
pp. 573
Author(s):  
João Miguel Santos ◽  
Joana F. Pereira ◽  
Andréa Marques ◽  
Diana B. Sequeira ◽  
Shimon Friedman

Background and Objectives: Symptomatic irreversible pulpitis in permanent mature teeth is a common indication for nonsurgical root canal treatment (NSRCT), but contemporary studies have reported on vital pulp therapy (VPT) applied in such teeth as a less invasive treatment. This systematic review assessed the outcomes of VPT, including partial and full pulpotomy performed with hydraulic calcium silicate cements (HCSCs) in permanent mature posterior teeth diagnosed with symptomatic irreversible pulpitis. Materials and Methods: The PRISMA guidelines were followed. The search strategy included PubMed®, EMBASE, Cochrane library and grey literature electronic databases. The quality assessment of the identified studies followed the Cochrane Collaboration Risk of Bias, ROBINS-I and Newcastle–Ottawa Scale tools. Results: The search of primary databases identified 142 articles, of which 9 randomized controlled trials and 3 prospective cohort studies were selected for review. The risk-of-bias was assessed as ‘high’ or ‘serious’, ‘fair’, and ‘low’ for three, seven and two articles, respectively. One to five years after VPT using HCSCs, the success rates mostly ranged from 78 to 90%. Based on two articles, the outcomes of the VPT and NSRCT were comparable at one and five years. Despite the necessity for the intra-operative pulp assessment in VPT procedures, the majority of the studies did not fully report on this step or on the time needed to achieve hemostasis. Small sample sizes, of under 23 teeth, were reported in three studies. Conclusions: The reviewed 12 articles reported favorable outcomes of the VPT performed with HCSCs in permanent mature posterior teeth with symptomatic irreversible pulpitis, with radiographic success in the range of 81 to 90%. Two articles suggested comparable outcomes of the VPT and root canal treatment. Universal case selection and outcome criteria needs to be established for VPT when considered as an alternative to NSRCT. This evidence supports the need for further research comparing longer-term outcomes of both of the treatment modalities.


Cancers ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (12) ◽  
pp. 2984
Author(s):  
Stepan M. Esagian ◽  
Christos D. Kakos ◽  
Emmanouil Giorgakis ◽  
Lyle Burdine ◽  
J. Camilo Barreto ◽  
...  

The role of adjuvant transarterial chemoembolization (TACE) for patients with resectable hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) undergoing hepatectomy is currently unclear. We performed a systematic review of the literature using the MEDLINE, Embase, and Cochrane Library databases. Random-effects meta-analysis was carried out to compare the overall survival (OS) and recurrence-free survival (RFS) of patients with resectable HCC undergoing hepatectomy followed by adjuvant TACE vs. hepatectomy alone in randomized controlled trials (RCTs). The risk of bias was assessed using the Risk of Bias 2.0 tool. Meta-regression analyses were performed to explore the effect of hepatitis B viral status, microvascular invasion, type of resection (anatomic vs. parenchymal-sparing), and tumor size on the outcomes. Ten eligible RCTs, reporting on 1216 patients in total, were identified. The combination of hepatectomy and adjuvant TACE was associated with superior OS (hazard ratio (HR): 0.66, 95% confidence interval (CI): 0.52 to 0.85; p < 0.001) and RFS (HR: 0.70, 95% CI: 0.56 to 0.88; p < 0.001) compared to hepatectomy alone. There were significant concerns regarding the risk of bias in most of the included studies. Overall, adjuvant TACE may be associated with an oncologic benefit in select HCC patients. However, the applicability of these findings may be limited to Eastern Asian populations, due to the geographically restricted sample. High-quality multinational RCTs, as well as predictive tools to optimize patient selection, are necessary before adjuvant TACE can be routinely implemented into standard practice. PROSPERO Registration ID: CRD42021245758.


Author(s):  
Julie L. Coleman ◽  
Christopher T. Carrigan ◽  
Lee M. Margolis

Abstract Background To achieve ideal strength/power to mass ratio, athletes may attempt to lower body mass through reductions in fat mass (FM), while maintaining or increasing fat-free mass (FFM) by manipulating their training regimens and diets. Emerging evidence suggests that consumption of high-fat, ketogenic diets (KD) may be advantageous for reducing body mass and FM, while retaining FFM. Methods A systematic review of the literature was conducted using PubMed and Cochrane Library databases to compare the effects of KD versus control diets (CON) on body mass and composition in physically active populations. Randomized and non-randomized studies were included if participants were healthy (free of chronic disease), physically active men or women age ≥ 18 years consuming KD (< 50 g carbohydrate/d or serum or whole blood β-hydroxybutyrate (βhb) > 0.5 mmol/L) for ≥14 days. Results Thirteen studies (9 parallel and 4 crossover/longitudinal) that met the inclusion criteria were identified. Aggregated results from the 13 identified studies show body mass decreased 2.7 kg in KD and increased 0.3 kg in CON. FM decreased by 2.3 kg in KD and 0.3 kg in CON. FFM decreased by 0.3 kg in KD and increased 0.7 kg in CON. Estimated energy balance based on changes in body composition was − 339 kcal/d in KD and 5 kcal/d in CON. Risk of bias identified some concern of bias primarily due to studies which allowed participants to self-select diet intervention groups, as well as inability to blind participants to the study intervention, and/or longitudinal study design. Conclusion KD can promote mobilization of fat stores to reduce FM while retaining FFM. However, there is variance in results of FFM across studies and some risk-of-bias in the current literature that is discussed in this systematic review.


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