The second WP in the Crosscare- Old project is focusing on:

Vertical cooperation between hospitals and municipal health- and care services in treating older patients.

WP 2 aims to answer the following research questions: “How do hospital admissions, length of stay and readmission for older patients vary across municipalities? To what degree do municipality, hospital and patient characteristics account for these differences?” We want to investigate how the associations between municipal and hospital care have changed over time and across geographical regions. A particular focus will be at changes before and after The Coordination Reform. In this way, we will empirically identify “best practice” vertical coordinated care; expressed by an optimal combination of hospital and municipality characteristics. Further, we ask: “Do the quality of collaboration between nurses working in hospital and local services moderate the effects of municipality, hospital, and patient characteristics on hospital admissions, length of stay and readmissions for older people?”

 

Data:

In order to answer the research questions, we analyze register data and data from a survey that will be conducted in 2017. The following register data will be analyzed, and merged with the survey data: a) Individual register data from the Norwegian Patient Registry (NPR), Causes of death register, Population database, Education register, Income register; b) Municipal level register data: KOSTRA, c) Hospital level register data: SAMDATA.

Nurses’ experiences and perspectives from vertical coordination of discharging older patients from hospitals will be investigated through a nationwide survey conducted among nurses in hospitals and local health and care services (members of The Norwegian Nursing Organization).