Geriatric Nursing Commons^™

Polypharmacy Practice Inquiry Project, Mary T. Skinner

DNP Projects

“The impending crisis, which has been foreseen for decades, is now upon us.The nation needs to act now to prepare the health care workforce to meet the care needs of older adults.” Institute of Medicine.

Given the rising tide of people over the age of 65, taking multiple medications or polypharmacy is a becoming more prevalent in older adults. Unfortunately, there are many negative consequences associated with polypharmacy. Specifically, this burden has been associated with greater health care costs and an increased risk of adverse drug events, drug-interactions, medication non-adherence, reduced functional capacity and multiple geriatric syndromes including cognitive impairment. …

Improving Depression Care For Older Home Health Patients, Sarah R. Schirmer

DNP Projects

Rates of depression in older home healthcare (HH) patients are highly prevalent. Although depression in this population is associated with increased rates of re-hospitalization, falls, and suicides, it is frequently under diagnosed and under treated. This Capstone Report examined this problem through three interrelated manuscripts. The first manuscript explored the problem through a review of the literature. This review determined that while there are many barriers to adequate depression care, programs that train clinicians to screen for depression and connect patients to depression care encourage adequate evaluation and treatment and can result in clinically significant changes in depression scores. This …