Rates of Delirium Diagnosis Do Not Improve with Emergency Risk Screening: Results of the Emergency Department Delirium Initiative Trial.

Objectives: To determine whether a bundled risk screening and warning or action card system improves formal delirium diagnosis and person-centered outcomes in hospitalized older adults.

Design: Prospective trial with sequential introduction of screening and interventional processes.

Setting: Two tertiary referral hospitals in Australia.

Nurse screening for delirium in older patients attending the emergency department.

Background: Delirium in older emergency department (ED) patients is common, associated with many adverse outcomes, and costly to manage. Delirium detection in the ED is almost universally poor.

Objectives: The authors aimed to develop a simple clinical risk screening tool that could be used by ED nurses as part of their initial assessment to identify patients at risk of delirium.

A questionnaire to determine nurses' knowledge of delirium and its risk factors.

Delirium is a frequent complication of hospital admission, especially among the elderly. It can have serious consequences in terms of morbidity, mortality and decreased quality of life. Nevertheless, an extensive literature review found that it is poorly recognised and poorly managed by medical and nursing staff.

Assessing cognition in elderly patients presenting to the emergency department.

Introduction And Background: Delirium occurs frequently among elderly patients in the Emergency Department (ED), and accurate assessment is difficult without knowledge of the patient's usual cognitive functioning. This audit was designed to determine whether routine cognitive screening of elderly patients in ED could lead to early identification of delirium.

Methodology: An audit using the abbreviate mental test (AMT) and Confusion Assessment Method (CAM) tools assessed 28 elderly ED patients for the presence of delirium.