Abstract
Abstract Introduction Many UK care home (CH) residents live with multiple long-term conditions, leading to high levels of healthcare utilisation. Previous studies have used routine data to describe their health and social care characteristics separately. Accurately identifying when an individual is admitted to a CH from routine data is challenging. This study aims to provide a combined health and social care profile of a cohort of long-stay CH residents, at the point of admission, using linked primary, secondary and social care data. Methods Individuals aged 65 and over registered to a GP practice contributing to the ‘Connected Bradford’ dataset who were admitted to a CH between January 2016 and December 2019 were included. Start and end dates for social care packages (nursing and residential) were identified from local authority social care data. Respite and reablement packages were excluded. Complete self-funders were not identified with this method. Linked secondary and primary care data were used to describe health characteristics. CH residents identified using primary care records and local authority data will be compared. Results 2801 individuals were admitted to a CH during the study period of whom 2048 (73%) were long-stay residents (>6 weeks). Only 70% of participants identified using local authority data, had a primary care code indicating CH residency in their primary care records. Median length of stay was 272 days (IQR 63 to 480). Mean age at admission was 85 years (SD 8), median Index of Multiple Deprivation decile five. 59% of residents required nursing care from admission. 79% of individuals were taking 5 or more medications. Conclusions Using local authority data offers a novel way to identify and characterise CH residents. Linkage of primary care records to local authority data improves identification of CH residents using routine data. Additional linkage with address history would further improve accuracy.
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