Support for Nursing Home Caregivers During the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Review.

Purpose: To review support systems for nursing home caregivers (NHCGs) that were implemented during the first year of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic.

Method: Database searches in PubMed, ScienceDirect, and CINAHL resulted in five publications.

Results: Studies differed in design, interventions, and outcomes.

Providing information about medication changes upon discharge from a geriatric unit: the community healthcare professionals' point of view.

Introduction: It is well known that polypharmacy is associated with adverse drug events. Accordingly, specialist geriatric units have to pay particular attention to the appropriateness of prescription and the withdrawal of potentially inappropriate medications. Even though community healthcare professionals are keen to received medication reconciliation results, the literature data show that the quality of communication between the hospital and the community needs to be improved.

Impact of influenza immunity on the mortality among older adults hospitalized with COVID-19: a retrospective cohort study.

It has been suggested that the outcomes of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) are better in individuals having recently received an influenza vaccine than in non-vaccinated individuals. We hypothesized that this association depends on the humoral responses against influenza viruses. We aim to assess the relationship between the humoral immunity against influenza and the 3-month all-cause mortality among hospitalized older patients with COVID-19.

Digital health technologies and Alzheimer's disease clinical trials: might decentralized clinical trials increase participation by people with cognitive impairment?

Background: Therapeutic trials in Alzheimer's disease (AD) face many obstacles-particularly with regard to screening and recruitment.

Discussion: Decentralized clinical trials (DCTs) are being developed in other diseases and appear to be of value for overcoming these difficulties. The use of remote visits offers hope of broader recruitment and thus a reduction in inequalities due to age, geography, and ethnicity.

High Prevalence of Geriatric Conditions Among Older Adults With Cardiovascular Disease.

As the population ages, the global cardiovascular disease burden will continue to increase, particularly among older adults. Increases in life expectancy and better cardiovascular care have significantly reshaped the epidemiology of cardiovascular disease and have created new patient profiles. The combination of older age, multiple comorbidities, polypharmacy, frailty, and adverse noncardiovascular outcomes is challenging our routine clinical practice in this field.

Neuroinflammation: A Possible Link Between Chronic Vascular Disorders and Neurodegenerative Diseases.

Various age-related diseases involve systemic inflammation, i.e. a stereotyped series of acute immune system responses, and aging itself is commonly associated with low-grade inflammation or inflamm'aging.

The Role of Telemedicine in the Management of the Behavioral and Psychological Symptoms of Dementia: A Systematic Review.

The first-line management of behavioral and psychological symptoms of dementia (BPSD) is based on nonpharmacologic interventions such as the provision of guidance and medical support to caregivers. However, accessibility to specialized care and medical resources is often scarce. The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has compromised the delivery of outpatient care (notably in order to minimize the risk of disease transmission), thus making it essential to provide other means of accessing care for these patient populations.

Analysis of the Impact of Selected Vitamins Deficiencies on the Risk of Disability in Older People.

Vitamin deficiencies have a serious impact on healthy aging in older people. Many age-related disorders have a direct or indirect impact on nutrition, both in terms of nutrient assimilation and food access, which may result in vitamin deficiencies and may lead to or worsen disabilities. Frailty is characterized by reduced functional abilities, with a key role of malnutrition in its pathogenesis.

A Local COVID-19 Support Platform for Nursing Homes: Feedback and Perspectives.

The COVID-19 pandemic has had a major impact on nursing homes (NHs), which were not prepared to manage infections among their at-risk patient populations. In order to comply with the French government's guidelines, we rapidly set up a local support platform (LSP) to help NHs manage their cases of COVID-19. The LSP comprised multidisciplinary decision support, a specialist phone hotline, mobile geriatric medicine teams, and videoconferences on COVID-19.

Persistence of Effect of Medication Review on Potentially Inappropriate Prescriptions in Older Patients Following Hospital Discharge.

Background: Potentially inappropriate prescriptions (PIPs) can lead to adverse drug reactions and should be avoided whenever possible.

Objective: Our objective was to assess the PIP resumption rate 6 months after discharge from our geriatric unit and to compare it with data in the literature.

Methods: This single-center observational study included patients aged ≥ 70 years with at least one PIP that had been stopped during hospitalization (according to Screening Tool for Older Persons Prescriptions [STOPP] and Screening Tool to Alert doctors to Right Treatment [START] criteria, version 2) between May 2018 and October 2018.

Influenza vaccination as a novel means of preventing coronary heart disease: Effectiveness in older adults.

Atherosclerosis can have various etiologies, including several newly recognized immunoinflammatory mechanisms. A growing body of evidence suggests that influenza infection is chronologically linked to acute myocardial infarction (AMI), and thus that the virus is a novel cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk factor. Morbidity and mortality rates for both influenza infection and AMI rise markedly with age.