The first MBCHF of 2023 had the theme relationships between care homes and hospitals. The topic generated a lot of interest and 68 people attended the online webinar. The audience was a mix of care home practitioners, managers, and academics interested in care home and dementia research. Two speakers were invited to discuss their research.

Dr Fawn Harrad-Hyde, from the LOROS Centre for Excellence and University of Leicester, discussed her work on ‘Making decisions during deteriorations in residents’ health.’ She shared findings from work that looked at the way staff recognised and responded to potential deterioration and what staff had to weigh up when deciding how best to proceed. Furthermore, she talked about ongoing work looking at whether or not peer-mentors (people who have been through a similar situation) could be trained to work with families of care home residents to help them to be better prepared around decision-making and have discussions about potential deteriorations and end of life.

Dr Carl Marincowitz, from the University of Sheffield, discussed a literature review and work in progress on ‘Understanding variation in Emergency Department attendances and inpatient admissions from care homes.’ He looked at what influences decisions to transfer older care home residents to the emergency department and preliminary findings on research looking at understanding variation in emergency department attendances, admissions, and place of death between care homes.

Attendees were engaged by sharing their own experiences and raising questions and many found the presentations “very insightful and thought provoking”. One care practitioner attendee said: “Thank you for a very informative topic. This is our first attendance to this forum, and we have definitely learnt a lot.”

The next MBCHF will be on Wednesday 14 June, from 2.00pm-4.00pm.