Coaching doctors to improve ethical decision-making in adult hospitalized patients potentially receiving excessive treatment. The CODE stepped-wedge cluster randomized controlled trial.

Purpose: The aim of this study was to assess whether coaching doctors to enhance ethical decision-making in teams improves (1) goal-oriented care operationalized via written do-not-intubate and do-not attempt cardiopulmonary resuscitation (DNI-DNACPR) orders in adult patients potentially receiving excessive treatment (PET) during their first hospital stay and (2) the quality of the ethical climate.

Methods: We carried out a stepped-wedge cluster randomized controlled trial in the medical intensive care unit (ICU) and 9 referring internal medicine departments of Ghent University Hospital between February 2022 and February 2023. Doctors and nurses in charge of hospitalized patients filled out the ethical decision-making climate questionnaire (ethical decision-making climate questionnaire, EDMCQ) before and after the study, and anonymously identified PET via an electronic alert during the entire study period.

Agreement and predictive value of the clinical frailty scale in hospitalized older patients.

Purpose: Our objective was to perform an external validity study of the clinical frailty scale (CFS) classification tree by determining the agreement of the CFS when attributed by a senior geriatrician, a junior geriatrician, or using the classification tree. Additionally, we evaluated the predictive value of the CFS for 6-month mortality after admission to an acute geriatric unit.

Methods: This prospective study was conducted in two acute geriatric units in Belgium.

Prognostic value of geriatric and cardiac parameters for one-year mortality in older heart failure patients. A multicentre, observational, prospective study.

Purpose: Heart failure is prevalent among older people and has a poor prognosis. The aim of this study is to identify potential prognostic, geriatric, and cardiac parameters which could help clinicians identify older heart failure patients at high risk for one-year mortality.

Methods: The multicentre, observational cohort study which included 147 heart failure patients aged ≥75 years, hospitalized in the cardiac or geriatric department in two hospitals.

Short-Term Opioid Treatment of Acute Locomotor Pain in Older Adults: Comparison of Effectiveness and Safety between Tramadol and Oxycodone: A Randomized Trial.

Introduction: We conducted a head-to-head comparison of step 2 (tramadol) and step 3 (oxycodone) of the WHO pain ladder in older adults with moderate to severe acute locomotor pain.

Materials And Methods: Multi-center prospective randomized study. Patients were 70 years or older, admitted to the acute geriatric ward of three hospitals, suffering from acute moderate to severe locomotor pain, and opioid-naive.