Development of a dysphagia cup to improve patients' fluid intake and reduce caregiver burden.

Ensuring that the elderly drink adequate fluids to meet their recommended daily allowance is often a challenge, especially among the elderly in hospitals and long-term care settings. The complex interplay of biological, medical and psychosocial factors that cause the elderly to become dehydrated is difficult to tackle especially in care settings where there is a staff shortage and heavy workload. The team realised that 90% of the elderly inpatients in the general ward of a teaching hospital in Singapore were not drinking enough to meet their needs, despite the hot and humid weather.