Delirium education for geriatric patients and their families: A quality improvement initiative

Delirium affects up to 50% of hospitalized older adults, contributing to poor outcomes. Family members can be engaged in delirium identification, prevention, and management. Rapid cycle improvement methodology was utilized to create a new educational handout on delirium. Using this handout, we taught family caregivers about delirium in a geriatric preoperative clinic. During the patient 's postoperative recovery in the hospital, we evaluated family members ' knowledge about delirium and application of concepts learned in the handout. All participating family members reported applying at least one prevention strategy. We implemented a new delirium educational handout for family members that resulted in robust knowledge of delirium and self-report of strategies taken to prevent delirium. All respondents engaged in at least one delirium prevention strategy. This was used in a preoperative setting, but it could also be implemented in other situations prior to an event that might lead to increased delirium risk.