Health Services Research (HSR) and The John A. Hartford Foundation are partnering to publish a Special Issue on Age-Friendly Health Systems. Abstract proposals are due November 22, 2021 November 30, 2021.
A key challenge facing health systems in the United States and around the world is how to best design services to provide care to a growing population of older adults that is heterogenous in health and function. The spectrum for this population will range from healthy and fit persons to others with serious illness and disability including a small number with high healthcare needs and who incur high costs. Across this spectrum, many of these individuals will be among the most vulnerable to the effects of inequality, climate change and emerging infectious diseases, as we have recently witnessed. Our healthcare systems are not always designed to address these vulnerabilities. As such, they are at increased risk for complications including delirium, medication-related adverse events, falls and complications associated with reduced mobility.
To address these issues, The John A. Hartford Foundation, Institute for Healthcare Improvement, American Hospital Association, and the Catholic Health Association have collaborated on an initiative to improve the safety and effectiveness of care for older adults. The Age-Friendly Health Systems (AFHS) movement builds on existing evidence-based models of geriatric care and integrates with a wider ecosystem of age-friendly public health, public policy, cities, and states.
The goal of the AFHS initiative is to aim for all care with older adults to be age-friendly care. Its work is intended to improve the experience of care for older adults, reduce health care-related harms, improve satisfaction with care, reduce costs, address health disparities, gaps, and inequities in care, and optimize value for patients, families, caregivers, healthcare providers, payers and health systems.
Therefore, the goal of this Special Issue is to highlight cutting-edge work that showcases the potential to learn from those involved in understanding, designing, implementing and studying age-friendly programs and policies.
Find more information about the issue and how to submit an abstract here.
