The Integrated Care Team: A primary care based-approach to support older adults with complex health needs

Many older adults have complex needs and experience high rates of acute care use and institutionalization. Comprehensive Geriatric Assessment (CGA) is a specialized multidimensional interprofessional intervention to prevent such outcomes, but access to CGA in the community is limited. The Integrated Care Team (ICT) is a proactive case-finding intervention to support older adults with complex needs in primary care. The ICT provides nurse practitioner-led shared-care supported by a pharmacist, family physician, and geriatrician. Patients undergo a CGA, and a person-centred plan of care is implemented. We conducted a mixed-methods evaluation of the ICT. Patients were 81 ± 9.2 years old, 71% were women. Patients had a high burden of dementia and multimorbidity and received 12.8 ± 5.8 prescriptions daily. The ICT improved prescribing and reduced emergency department visits by 49.5% (P = 0.0001). Patients, care partners, and referring physicians reported high satisfaction with care. The ICT is currently being expanded to support additional primary care providers.