Promoting Age-Friendly Healthcare Across Washington State
Anita Souza, PhD, has spent the past year working with healthcare providers in tribal, rural and underserved communities to help them ensure they can meet the needs of older adults.
And the good news is that many already are.
“We help our partners make sure that they are meeting the comprehensive needs of older adults, and for those who we determine are already doing this, we want to celebrate them and make sure that they are getting the national recognition they deserve,” says Souza, who serves as the age-friendly outreach coordinator for the UW Northwest Geriatrics Workforce Enhancement Center, a federally funded initiative based at Harborview Medical Center.
Led by UW Medicine’s Elizabeth Phelan, MD, MS, the center’s goal is to reinforce age-friendly care through collaborative education, hands-on training and community partnerships. The specific areas of focus are called “the four Ms,” and include:
- What matters to each patient and their family; this first point is of prime importance
- Safe, effective use of medication
- Mentation, including the prevention or management of dementia, depression and delirium
- Mobility to preserve function and independence
Souza said three health systems, encompassing a total of four primary care clinics, one nursing home and one critical access hospital, have completed the age-friendly recognition program this year. The care settings included four primary care clinics and a critical access hospital in Washington state. These health systems received Age-Friendly Level 1 recognition through the Institute for Healthcare Improvement.
“We help providers optimize their clinic workflow so that they meet each of those needs and, by and large, what we’re finding is that they are,” Souza says. “It’s really about work force development.”
That includes Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) students at the UW School of Nursing, who can apply for a traineeship that provides stipends to support work at tribal health clinics and clinics in rural and underserved areas.
“We have them engaged in longitudinal clinical placements in these settings,” says Souza, a clinical professor at the UW School of Nursing. “It’s not just about clinical hours; they are developing leadership skills, collaborating with inter-professional teams and learning how to deliver age-friendly, high-quality care in a real-world context. Our older adults in the community want to know that we are serving them well and staying current with best practices in care. Our students often hear, ‘I’m so glad that somebody has come out to our community, and that you’re interested in learning about our community and serving us.’”