Table 1. Baseline characteristics of nursing homes (N = 20) and participants who died (N = 131).
| Usual Care (n = 64) |
FCC (n = 67) |
TOTAL (N = 131) |
||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nursing home characteristics | ||||
| Proportion of residents with dementia, median (IQR) | 67.5 (24) | 67.5 (28) | 67.5 (24) | |
| Nursing staff hours to bed ratio, median (IQR) | 20.7 (8.9) | 21.2 (4.2) | 21 (5.9) | |
| Questionnaire on Palliative care for Advanced Dementia staff median (IQR) |
||||
| staff Knowledge Test | 14 (3) | 16 (4)‡ | 15 (4) | |
| staff Attitude Scale | 48 (8) | 48 (8) | 48 (8) | |
| Participants at baseline | ||||
| Age, mean ± SD | 85.8 ± 8.2 | 84.7 ± 7.9 | 85.3 ± 8.0 | |
| range | 57–101 | 60–104 | 57–104 | |
| Female, n (%) | 37 (58) | 41 (61) | 78 (60) | |
| Born in Australia, n (%) | 33 (52) | 47 (70)† | 80 (61) | |
| Length of stay (months), median (IQR) | 20.5 (43) | 29 (41) | 26 (42) | |
| Time to death (months), median (IQR) | 8 (8) | 6 (10) | 7 (9) | |
| Died in nursing home, n (%) | 55 (89) | 58 (88) | 113 (88) | |
| Visitor frequency, n (%) | ||||
| Daily or more | 22 (34) | 13 (19)† | 35 (27) | |
| Between daily-weekly | 27 (42) | 15 (22) | 42 (32) | |
| Weekly | 6 (9) | 19 (28) | 25 (19) | |
| Fortnightly or less | 9 (14) | 20 (30) | 29 (22) | |
| Functional Assessment Staging Tool, n (%) | ||||
| level 6 | 13 (20) | 19 (28) | 32 (24) | |
| level 7 | 51 (80) | 48 (72) | 99 (76) | |
| Australian-modified Karnofsky Performance Status, n (%) | ||||
| 20: totally bedfast | 18 (28) | 12 (18) | 30 (23) | |
| 30: almost completely bedfast | 14 (22) | 8 (12) | 22 (17) | |
| 40: in bed >50% of the time | 10 (16) | 20 (30) | 30 (23) | |
| 50: considerable assistance | 22 (34) | 27 (40) | 49 (37) | |
| Quality of Life in Late Stage Dementia, median (IQR) | 25 (13) | 25 (9) | 25 (10) | |
FCC, facilitated case conferencing; IQR, inter-quartile range; SD, standard deviation
† P < 0.05
‡ P < 0.001