Encouraging Best Practice in Residential Aged Care Program: Final Evaluation Report
4.6 - Broader community impacts
- Key Messages
- Executive Summary
- About This Report
1 - Introduction- 2 - Evidence, Changes in Practice and the EBPRAC Program
- 3 - Program Delivery/Implementation
4 - Program Impact- 5 - Capacity Building
- 6 - Generalisability
- 7 - Sustainability
- 8 - Dissemination
- 9 - Appropriateness
- 10 - Cost Implications for Government and Aged Care Providers
- 11 - Perceptions of High-Level Stakeholders
- 12 - Discussion and Conclusions
- 13 - Recommendations
- References
- Appendices 1 to 6
- Appendices 7 to 12
- Appendices 13 to 17
Only two projects involved large numbers of referrals to health professionals working outside residential aged care. The pain management project referred 150 residents to general practitioners, 80 to physiotherapists, 15 to occupational therapists and 10 to a pain clinic. The oral health project referred 137 to a dentist after initial oral health assessments were undertaken, with another 39 referrals to a dentist after follow-up oral health assessment. In addition, six residents were referred for physiotherapy by the falls prevention project and the wound management project referred seven residents to a dietician and one resident to a vascular surgeon.
Projects were asked to identify the impact that project implementation may have had on hospitalisation of residents. Only three projects collected any data on hospitalisation and it is not possible from the data, either because of the small numbers involved or because no change was detected, to discern any impact on hospitalisation.
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