Best Case/Worst Case-ICU: protocol for a multisite, stepped-wedge, randomised clinical trial of scenario planning to improve communication in the ICU in US trauma centres for older adults with serious injury.

Introduction: Poor communication about serious injury in older adults can lead to treatment that is inconsistent with patient preferences, create conflict and strain healthcare resources. We developed a communication intervention called Best Case/Worst Case-intensive care unit (ICU) that uses daily scenario planning, that is, a narrative description of plausible futures, to support prognostication and facilitate dialogue among patients, their families and the trauma ICU team. This article describes a protocol for a multisite, randomised, stepped-wedge study to test the effectiveness of the intervention on the quality of communication (QOC) in the ICU.

Effect of Delay and Disruption in Venous Thromboembolism Prophylaxis in Trauma Patients: Case-Control Study.

Background: Trauma patients are at high risk for venous thromboembolism (VTE) and bleeding. The purpose of this study was to characterize percentage of VTE chemoprophylaxis given to trauma patients with and without a VTE.

Study Design: This retrospective case-control study evaluated trauma patients admitted to a Level I trauma center.

Association of Patient Reported Global Health Measures with Frailty Scores in Acutely Injured Older Adults.

Purpose: The older population is particularly vulnerable to traumatic injury. Frailty scores, used to estimate the physiologic status of an individual, are key to identifying those most at risk for injury. Global health measures such as the Veterans RAND 12 Item Health Survey (VR-12) are quality of life measures that assess older adults' overall perception of their health and may serve as a useful adjunct when predicting frailty.

Making your geriatric and palliative programs a strength: TQIP guideline implementation and the VRC perspective.

Background: Older patients compose approximately 30% of trauma patients treated in the USA but make up nearly 50% of deaths from trauma. To help standardize and elevate care of these patients, the American College of Surgeons (ACS) Trauma Quality Improvement Program's best practice guidelines for geriatric trauma management was published in 2013 and that for palliative care was published in 2017. Here, we discuss how palliative care and geriatrics quality metrics can be tracked and used for performance improvement and leveraged as a strength for trauma verification.