Browsing by Author "Lobo, A"
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- A brief diagnostic screening instrument for mental disturbances in general medical wardsPublication . Fink, P; Ørnbøl, E; Huyse, F; Jonge, P; Lobo, A; Herzog, T; Slaets, J; Arolt, V; Cardoso, G; Rigatelli, M; Hansen, MOBJECTIVE: Mental illness is prevalent among general hospital ward patients but often goes unrecognised. The aim of this study was to validate the SCL-8d as a brief questionnaire for mental disturbances for use in general hospitals. METHODS: The study included 2040 patients, 18 years or older, consecutively admitted to 11 general internal medicine wards in seven European countries. All patients were screened on admission by means of the SCL-8d questionnaire. The psychometric performance (i.e., the internal validity) of the SCL-8d scale was tested using modern item response theory (IRT) in the form of the Rasch model. RESULTS: Differences between sample characteristics were considerable. Even so, the SCL-8d scale showed a remarkable, statistically significant fit in terms of internal homogeneity (P>.01) in all individual settings, except in Spain and Germany where the item "Everything is an effort" had to be excluded to obtain a fit. When pooling data from all centres, an excellent statistical significance of fit (P>.05) was obtained by exclusion of the "Effort" item. The scale was homogeneous as to gender (P>.05), but not age as it performed better among young patients than among patients older than 60 years (P<.01). In these two patient groups both internal and external homogeneity (gender, median age) was achieved. The SCL-8d sum score showed a marked correlation with current and previous treatment for mental illness. CONCLUSION: Apart from the "Effort" item ranking differently on the latent severity dimension as to age, the SCL-8d seems very robust from a psychometric point of view. Besides being short, the SCL-8d scale contains only emotional symptoms. It would therefore seem to be an excellent diagnostic tool for use in medical settings.
- Care complexity in the general hospital: results from a European studyPublication . de Jonge, P; Huyse, F; Lobo, A; Slaets, J; Herzog, T; Lyons, J; Opmeer, B; Stein, B; Arolt, V; Balogh, N; Cardoso, GThere is increasing pressure to effectively treat patients with complex care needs from the moment of admission to the general hospital. In this study, the authors developed a measurement strategy for hospital-based care complexity. The authors' four-factor model describes the interrelations between complexity indicators, highlighting differences between length of stay (LOS), objective complexity (such as medications or consultations), complexity ratings by the nurse, and complexity ratings by the doctor. Their findings illustrate limitations in the use of LOS as a sole indicator for care complexity. The authors show how objective and subjective complexity indicators can be used for early and valid detection of patients needing interdisciplinary care.
- COMPRI--an instrument to detect patients with complex care needs: results from a European studyPublication . Huyse, F; Jongue, P; Slaets, J; Lobo, A; Herzog, T; Lyons, J; Opmeer, B; Stein, B; Arolt, V; Cardoso, GThe authors developed a screening instrument to detect patients in need of complex care coordination at admission to a general hospital. On the basis of a series of risk factors for care complexity, the authors constructed a short, care complexity prediction instrument (COMPRI) and assessed its qualities. The COMPRI is an easily administered screening instrument that detects patients at risk for complex care needs for whom care coordination is indicated. COMPRI's predictive power exceeds all currently available case-mix instruments
- Consultation-Liaison psychiatric service delivery: results from a European studyPublication . Huyse, F; Herzog, T; Lobo, A; Malt, U; Opmeer, B; Stein, B; Jonge, P; Dijck, R; Creed, F; Crespo, MD; Cardoso, GThe reported findings of the European Consultation-Liaison Workgroup (ECLW) Collaborative Study describe consultation-liaison service delivery by 56 services from 11 European countries aggregated on a C-L service level. During the period of 1 year (1991), the participants applied a standardized, reliability tested method of patient data collection, and data were collected describing pertinent characteristics of the hospital, the C-L service, and the participating consultants. The consultation rate of 1% (median; 1.4% mean) underscores the discrepancy between epidemiology and the services delivered. The core function of C-L services in general hospitals is a quick, comprehensive emergency psychiatric function. Reasons to see patients were the following. deliberate self-harm (17%), substance abuse (7.2%), current psychiatric symptoms (38.6%), and unexplained physical complaints (18.6%) (all means). A significant number of patients are old and seriously ill. Mood disorders and organic mental disorders are most predominant (17.7%). Somatoform and dissociative disorders together constitute 7.5%. C-L services in European countries are mainly emergency psychiatric services and perform an important bridge function between primary, general health, and mental health care.
- European Consultation-Liaison Psychiatric Services: the ECLW Collaborative StudyPublication . Huyse, F; Herzog, T; Lobo, A; Malt, U; Opmeer, B; Stein, B; Creed, F; Crespo, MD; Cardoso, G; Guimarães-Lopes, R; Mayou, R; van Moffaert, M; Rigatelli, M; Sakkas, P; Tienari, POBJECTIVE: To describe the patterns of organization of consultation-liaison (C-L) services in 11 European countries in relation to hospital characteristics and national approaches to C-L psychiatry. METHOD: Cross-sectional survey. RESULTS: Services can best be described in terms of their size and seniority of their staff and whether or not they are multidisciplinary. Single-discipline services are based upon the standard medical consultant model, whereas those with multidisciplinary teams work in a way that is comparable with community mental health teams. German psychosomatic C-L services belonged to either model. National differences were found. CONCLUSION: This first international study provides empirical evidence for the wide variation in the organization of C-L services. In view of the increasing numbers of patients with psychiatric disorder who are being treated in general hospitals and the changing patterns of medical care there are important implications for clarification and improvement of the role of C-L services.
- European consultation-liaison services and their user populations: the European Consultation-Liaison Workgroup Collaborative StudyPublication . Huyse, F; Herzog, T; Lobo, A; Malt, U; Opmeer, B; Stein, B; Cardoso, GThe authors identified variations in the characteristics of patients referred to 56 consultation-liaison (C-L) services in 11 European countries. The authors found differences in the types of patients referred to the services, and there were significant differences between countries. The first difference lays in whether services saw patients for deliberate self-harm and for substance abuse. German psychosomatic C-L services saw virtually no such patients, although in other C-L services these patients constituted one-quarter to one-third of the patients referred. The second difference lays in the remaining group of referred patients. This group is best characterized by two dimensions. One describes the severity of psychopathology -- ranging from organic mental conditions to somatization. The other describes the clarity of the physical diagnosis -- ranging from patients referred by surgical wards to those referred by general medicine and neurology wards.
- Mental disturbances and perceived complexity of nursing care in medical inpatients: results from a European studyPublication . Jonge, P; Zomerdijk, M; Huyse, F; Fink, P; Herzog, T; Lobo, A; Slaetz, J; Harolt, V; Balogh, N; Cardoso, G; Rigatelli, MAIMS AND OBJECTIVES: The relationship between mental disturbances - anxiety and depression, somatization and alcohol abuse - on admission to internal medicine units and perceived complexity of care as indicated by the nurse at discharge was studied. The goal was to study the utility of short screeners for mental disturbances to select patients for case-management on admission. DESIGN: The study had a cohort design: patients were included on admission and followed through their hospital stay until discharge. The study was conducted within the framework of the European Biomed 1 Risk Factor study. RESEARCH METHODS AND INSTRUMENTS: In the first 3 days of admission the patients were interviewed by a trained health care professional, who scored the SCL-8D, a somatization questionnaire based on the Whiteley-7 and the CAGE. At discharge, nurses rated the complexity of the patient's care. RESULTS: Patients with high scores on anxiety and depression (SCL-8D) and on somatization received higher ratings on perceived nursing complexity than those with low scores, with and without control for age, severity of illness and chronicity. The actual nursing intensity and medical care utilization, as measured daily by means of a checklist, could not explain these relations. No differences were found between patients with high or low scores on alcohol abuse. CONCLUSIONS: The study shows a potential use of screeners for mental disturbances to detect patients for whom nurses might need additional help. However, mental disturbance is not the sole criterion: functional status and other variables that predict medical and nursing care utilization should be included in a screening strategy for case-management programmes
- Risk factors for complex care needs in general medical inpatients: results from a European studyPublication . de Jonge, P; Huyse, F; Herzog, T; Lobo, A; Slaets, J; Lyons, J; Opmeer, B; Stein, B; Arolt, V; Balogh, N; Cardoso, GThe authors linked admission risk factors to a series of indicators for complex care delivery to enable detection of patients in need of care coordination at the moment of admission to the general hospital. The authors found 13 risk factors to be predictive of more than one indicator of care complexity. An admission risk screening procedure to detect patients in need of care coordination should focus on these risk factors and should include predictions made by doctors and nurses at admission and information collected from the patient and the medical chart
- The ECLW Collaborative study II: patient registration form (PRF) instrument, training and reliability. European Consultation/Liaison Work group.Publication . Lobo, A; Huyse, F; Herzog, T; Malt, U; Opmeer, B; ECLW Coordination Center; Cardoso, GThis paper describes the development and testing of the Patient Registration Form (PRF), a standardized instrument for the description of patients seen by consultation-liaison (C-L) psychiatrists and psychosomatists in general hospitals, the referral patterns, the C-L interventions and their outcomes. The PRF study is part of a large multi-centre. European investigation on the effectiveness of mental health service delivery, conducted by the European C-L Workgroup for General Hospital Psychiatry and Psychosomatics (ECLW) and performed in the framework of the of the E.C. 4th Medical and Health Research Program. The final version of the PRF consists of 68 items. It was developed by the Program Management Group (PMG) and National Coordinators (NC) after long preparatory studies to assure both face and content validity and pilot testing. Two hundred and twenty consultants, who required 40 hours of training and came from 14 different European countries and 90 different sites, participated in the final reliability study. The PRF was tested in 13 written case histories. A "gold standard' for the correct answers in each item was decided by "consensus ratings' of the PMG and a subsequent 80% agreement by the NCs. A high standard (average kappa (k) > or = 0.70; at least 2/3 of the PRF items, kappa > or = 0.70) was required for the rater to be considered as "reliable' (RR). The consultants considered the PRF both "feasible' and 93.2% of them fulfilled the RR criteria. The calculated rater-"gold standard' reliability was satisfactory: only four PRF items were identified with low agreement coefficients and no biases were observed cross-nationally in the ratings. Given the implications of misclassification for evaluating C-L effectiveness and services, these results are important and the achievement unprecedented.
- The ECLW Collaborative Study: III. Training and reliability of ICD-10 psychiatric diagnoses in the general hospital setting--an investigation of 220 consultants from 14 European countries. European Consultation Liaison WorkgroupPublication . Malt, U; Huyse, F; Herzog, T; Lobo, A; Rijssenbeek, A; ECLW Coordination Center; Cardoso, GA comprehensive training program for reliable use of the ICD/10 in Consultation-Liaison (C-L) psychiatry was conducted with 220 psychiatrists and psychologists from 14 European countries. The training included rating of written test cases and development of a coding manual to avoid diagnostic pitfalls not addressed in the ICD-10 manual. Following this training, all consultants rated 13 written case histories. One hundred sixty-seven consultants (76%) had a kappa (kappa) of at least 0.70. Only 13 (6%) had a kappa 0.40. The percentage of high reliability raters was evenly distributed among the different countries. Consultants had some problems in the differentiation between adjustment disorders and depressive disorders, and in the classification of disorders where ICD-10 differs from the DSM-III-R system. National biases in diagnostic practice were found with regard to the "case" concept and the role of alcohol in confusional states. Finnish consultants coded "no psychiatric disorder" significantly more often, whereas German and Italian consultants attributed delirious state more often to alcohol than consultants from other European countries. The study demonstrates that it is possible to achieve acceptable interrater reliability in applying the ICD-10 guidelines, through training programs designed for C-L psychiatrists and psychologists. Nevertheless, this first cross-national study shows the importance of addressing differences in national diagnostic practice.