While patient and citizen engagement has been recognized as a crucial element in health care reform, limited attention has been paid to how best to engage seniors — the largest growing segment of the population and Canada’s greatest users of the health care system. CFN’s May 2015 webinar featured final results from Dr. Paul Stolee’s CFN-funded knowledge synthesis project. To improve the system for this population, seniors and their families need to be engaged as active partners in health care research and planning, and in decision-making for their care. The CHOICE Knowledge Synthesis Project: Choosing Healthcare Options by Involving Canada’s Elderly addressed this issue by synthesizing current knowledge on patient, family, and caregiver engagement to develop best practice guidelines and recommendations for engaging older patients and their families and caregivers in health care research, planning, and clinical decision making. The project synthesized information from other patient and citizen engagement initiatives, from previous research, and most importantly, from seniors, families and caregivers themselves. To learn more about this project, click here.
CFN that caring for older adults living with frailty is a complex, Canada-wide issue that requires multi-faceted, national strategies and solutions, and our monthly webinars are one way we bring together talented people to focus on this goal.
Presenters: Dr. Paul Stolee (Principal Investigator), Dr. Jacobi Elliott and Heather MacNeil (HQP), University of Waterloo