Frailty monitoring software for the elderly assisted in health primary care: evaluation of its effectiveness and efficiency

Abstract

The primary health care (PHC) can offer whole care to the elderly by identifying the specific needs of non-frail elderly, pre frail and frail. However, tools that facilitate the effective actions of these policies are scarce in the planning and monitoring of the fragile conditions of elderly users in the Unified Health System (SUS). A computer monitoring system to be used by the health team to identify elderly frailty levels can collaborate in decision making in elderly care management, and also can serve as a model for other Brazilian health facilities. This study is a continuation of an earlier study entitled "Tool for monitoring fragility levels and associated factors in elderly attended by primary health care settings in São Carlos." The first phase of the project was successfully completed and evaluated 346 elderly enrolled in ABS a highly vulnerable region. It was evaluated various aspects related to the fragility and carried out full clinical examination, including the measurement of inflammatory cytokines. From the results found, a tool was created from an algorithm aiming to direct the care of the elderly according to the fragility levels (not fragil, pre-frail and frail). In this new phase, the objective is to evaluate the usability, effectiveness and efficiency of this computational tool for monitoring fragility levels in the elderly. For this, through quantitative and qualitative methods, the tool will be enhanced and then the health team of ABS will be trained in the use of it. They will be monitored accessibility and usability through data loggers; use of health services for the elderly and a frequent monitoring of the decision-making of these professionals from the frailty diagnosis will be carried out. Furthermore, the elderly will be reevaluated over the tool and questionnaires, performing a crossed valid tool for identifying efficiency. It is expected that the tool is effective, efficient and cost effective in detecting frailty levels of elderly attended by PHC. (AU)