Being Your Best: protocol for a feasibility study of a codesigned approach to reduce symptoms of frailty in people aged 65 years or more after transition from hospital.

Abstract

The population is ageing, with increasing health and supportive care needs. For older people, complex chronic health conditions and frailty can lead to a cascade of repeated hospitalisations and further decline. Existing solutions are fragmented and not person centred. The proposed <i>Being Your Best</i> programme integrates care across hospital and community settings to address symptoms of frailty. A multicentre pragmatic mixed methods study aiming to recruit 80 community-dwelling patients aged ≥65 years recently discharged from hospital. <i>Being Your Best</i> is a codesigned 6-month programme that provides referral and linkage with existing services comprising four modules to prevent or mitigate symptoms of physical, nutritional, cognitive and social frailty. Feasibility will be assessed in terms of recruitment, acceptability of the intervention to participants and level of retention in the programme. Changes in frailty (Modified Reported Edmonton Frail Scale), cognition (Mini-Mental State Examination), functional ability (Barthel and Lawton), loneliness (University of California Los Angeles Loneliness Scale-3 items) and nutrition (Malnutrition Screening Tool) will also be measured at 6 and 12 months. The study has received approval from Monash Health Human Research Ethics Committee (RES-19-0000904L). Results will be disseminated through peer-reviewed journals, conference and seminar presentations. ACTRN12620000533998; Pre-results.