Publications by authors named "Margaret O ' Connor"

Background And Objectives: Despite effective secondary prevention, including oral anticoagulant (OAC) therapy, the risk of recurrent stroke (RS) in patients with atrial fibrillation (AF) remains substantial with an annualized risk of 3.2%-6.5% per year.

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Background: Early supported discharge (ESD) facilitates early discharge from acute hospitals with continued rehabilitation in the home environment from a multi-disciplinary team at the same intensity as would be received in the inpatient setting. Emerging evidence suggests it can have a positive impact on the care of older adults on discharge from the acute hospital setting to home. This study aims to characterize an inreach model of ESD for older adults discharged from four hospitals in the Mid-West of Ireland and describe its impact on clinical and process outcomes at 30 and 180 days.

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Background: Multidisciplinary comprehensive geriatric assessment (CGA) improves outcomes in hospitalised older adults but there is limited evidence on its effectiveness in the emergency department. We aimed to assess the benefits of CGA in the emergency department for older adults living with frailty.

Methods: In this randomised controlled trial, we enrolled older adults (≥75 years) who presented to the emergency department with medical complaints at University Hospital Limerick (Limerick, Ireland).

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Background: In emergency care settings, screening for disease or risk factors for poor health outcomes among older adults can identify those in need of specialist and early intervention. The aim of this study was to identify barriers and facilitators to implementing older person-centred screening in emergency care settings in the Mid-West of Ireland.

Methods: This study employed a qualitative descriptive design underpinned by the theoretical domains framework (TDF).

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This paper is a personal reflection on involvement in the development of the first voluntary assisted dying legislation in Australia. Points of contention are discussed, where plural values were evident, as the legislation progressed towards implementation. Finally, ongoing areas of difficulty with the legislation are listed, where further thought is required to ensure ease of access for those in need.

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Background: Frailty is a risk factor for presentation to the ED, in-hospital mortality, prolonged hospital stays and functional decline at discharge. Profiling the prevalence and level of frailty within the acute hospital setting is vital to ensure evidence-based practice and service development within the construct of frailty. The aim of this cross-sectional study was to establish the prevalence of frailty and co-morbidities among older adults in an acute hospital setting.

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Background: Traditional models of palliative care have been tested by the challenges of caring for increasing numbers of people at the end stages of a chronic non-malignant illness. The COVID-19 pandemic and consequent reliance on telehealth services, has enabled the development of creative models of care.

Aims: To improve home-based palliative care for people with chronic illness using telehealth, and this was demonstrated using quality-of-life measures.

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Objectives: There is conflicting evidence regarding the outcomes of acute stroke patients who present to hospital within normal working hours ('in-hours') compared with the 'out-of-hours' period. This study aimed to assess the effect of time of stroke presentation on outcomes within the Irish context, to inform national stroke service delivery.

Materials And Methods: A secondary analysis of data from the Irish National Audit of Stroke (INAS) from Jan 2016 to Dec 2019 was carried out.

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Background: There is growing momentum worldwide for assisted dying. In Australia, voluntary assisted dying may occur in any setting, including an intensive care unit (ICU). As the subject of much debate worldwide, exploring ICU clinicians' perceptions of assisted dying is essential.

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Background: There is a paucity of research reporting the long-term outcomes of older adults who have completed geriatric rehabilitation following COVID-19.

Aim: The primary aim of this study is to describe the long-term functional outcomes of a cohort of older adults with acute COVID-19 who have completed inpatient geriatric rehabilitation.

Methods: This is a subgroup analysis of Irish data from a pan-European prospective cohort study.

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Aim: Older adults comprise a growing proportion of Emergency Department (ED) attendees and are vulnerable to adverse outcomes following an ED visit including ED reattendance within 30 days. Interventions to reduce older adults' risk of adverse outcomes following an ED attendance are proliferating and often focus on improving the transition from the ED to the community. To optimise the effectiveness of interventions it is important to determine how older adults experience the transition from the ED to the community.

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Background: This study aimed to explore the process, clinical, and patient-reported outcomes of older adults who received an interdisciplinary Comprehensive Geriatric Assessment (CGA) in the emergency department (ED) over a six-month period after their initial ED attendance.

Patients And Methods: A prospective cohort study recruited older adults aged ≥65 years who presented to the ED of a university teaching hospital in Ireland. Baseline assessment data comprising a battery of demographic variables and validated indices were obtained at the index ED attendance.

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Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a neurodevelopmental disorder with a strong genetic basis. ASDs are commonly characterized by impairments in language, restrictive and repetitive behaviors, and deficits in social interactions. Although ASD is a highly heterogeneous disease with many different genes implicated in its etiology, many ASD-associated genes converge on common cellular defects, such as aberrant neuronal morphology and synapse dysregulation.

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Background: Comprehensive Geriatric Assessment (CGA) is a multidimensional interdisciplinary process that addresses an older adult's biopsychosocial capabilities to create an integrated and co-ordinated plan of care. While quantitative evidence that demonstrates the positive impacts of CGA on clinical and process outcomes has been synthesised, to date qualitative research reporting how older adults and service providers experience CGA has not been synthesised. This study aimed to systematically review and synthesise qualitative studies reporting community-dwelling older adults', caregivers' and healthcare professionals' (HCP) experiences of CGA in the primary care and out-patient (OPD) setting.

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Background: Comprehensive geriatric assessment (CGA) is considered the gold standard approach to improving a range of outcomes for older adults living with frailty admitted to hospital. To date, research has predominantly focused on quantitative syntheses of the international evidence with limited focus on qualitative synthesis of stakeholder perspectives. This review aims to resolve this research gap by identifying and synthesising qualitative studies reporting multiple stakeholders' experiences of inpatient CGA.

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Article Synopsis
  • Mutations in autism spectrum disorder (ASD) risk genes affect neural network dynamics, leading to abnormal behaviors.
  • Researchers studied the hippocampal networks in transgenic mice lacking an ASD-risk gene, identifying significant learning and memory deficits tied to these mutations.
  • Analysis revealed that while individual neuron excitability remained unchanged, the CA1 network in knockout mice was overly synchronized during movement, disrupting normal spatial memory functions and contributing to ASD-like behaviors.
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Background: Older adults frequently attend the emergency department (ED) and experience high rates of subsequent adverse outcomes including functional decline, ED re-presentation and unplanned hospital admission. The development of effective interventions to prevent such outcomes is a key priority for research and service provision. Our aim was to evaluate the feasibility of a physiotherapy-led integrated care intervention for older adults discharged from the ED (ED PLUS).

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Background: Innovations in models of care for older adults living with frailty presenting to the emergency department (ED) have become a key priority for clinicians, researchers and policymakers due to the deleterious outcomes older adults experience due to prolonged exposure to such an environment. This study aimed to develop a set of expert consensus-based statements underpinning operational design, outcome measurement and evaluation of a Frailty at the Front Door (FFD) model of care for older adults within an Irish context.

Methods: A modified real-time Delphi method was used.

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Article Synopsis
  • Palliative care in Ethiopia, especially in rural areas where over 78% of the population resides, is limited and predominantly focused on urban settings, with significant reliance on donor funding.
  • A qualitative study revealed that palliative care is not well integrated into the national health policies or educational programs, leading to a lack of awareness and inadequate services for chronically ill patients beyond HIV.
  • To improve palliative care access in these regions, enhancements such as better integration into the national health care plan and increased awareness among health professionals are crucial.
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Background: Validated screening tools can be utilised to detect early disease processes and risk factors for disease and adverse outcomes. Consequently, identifying individuals in need of early intervention and targeted assessment can be achieved through the implementation of screening in the ED. Successful implementation can be impacted by a lack of resources and ineffective integration of screening into the clinical workflow.

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Background: The COVID-19 pandemic created a complex high-risk clinical research environment with clinical research activities significantly impacted. Clinical research stakeholders adapted rapidly to new clinical practices; PPE, infection control policies, all while engaging with a more unwell patient demographic. The aim of this study is to explore the experiences of conducting clinical research during COVID-19 with clinical research stakeholders.

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Background: Availability and accessibility of opioids are a worldwide problem. In low-resource settings, such as Ethiopia, access to opioids is either limited or nonexistent and legally restricted in health care settings. This study aimed to identify barriers for the availability and accessibility of opioids in Ethiopian rural and regional health care settings.

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