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Study protocol for ‘we DECide’: implementation of advance care planning for nursing home residents with dementia
Author(s) -
Ampe Sophie,
Sevenants Aline,
Coppens Evelien,
Spruytte Nele,
Smets Tinne,
Declercq Anja,
Audenhove Chantal
Publication year - 2015
Publication title -
journal of advanced nursing
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.948
H-Index - 155
eISSN - 1365-2648
pISSN - 0309-2402
DOI - 10.1111/jan.12601
Subject(s) - advance care planning , nursing , context (archaeology) , dementia , test (biology) , intervention (counseling) , psychology , audit , medicine , palliative care , business , disease , paleontology , accounting , pathology , biology
Aim To evaluate the effects of ‘we DEC ide’, an educational intervention for nursing home staff on shared decision‐making in the context of advance care planning for residents with dementia. Background Advance care planning (preparing care choices for when persons no longer have decision‐making capacity) is of utmost importance for nursing home residents with dementia, but is mostly not realized for this group. Advance care planning consists of discussing care choices and making decisions and corresponds to shared decision‐making (the involvement of persons and their families in care and treatment decisions). Design This quasi‐experimental pre‐test–post‐test study is conducted in 19 nursing homes (Belgium). Participants are nursing home staff. Methods ‘We DEC ide’ focuses on three crucial moments for discussing advance care planning: the time of admission, crisis situations and everyday conversations. The ‘ ACP ‐audit’ assesses participants’ views on the organization of advance care planning (organizational level), the ‘ OPTION scale’ evaluates the degree of shared decision‐making in individual conversations (clinical level) and the ‘ IFC ‐ SDM Questionnaire’ assesses participants’ views on I mportance, F requency and C ompetence of realizing shared decision‐making (clinical level). (Project funded: July 2010). Discussion The study hypothesis is that ‘we DEC ide’ results in a higher realization of shared decision‐making in individual conversations on advance care planning. A better implementation of advance care planning will lead to a higher quality of end‐of‐life care and more person‐centred care. We believe our study will be of interest to researchers and to professional nursing home caregivers and policy‐makers.