From the editor
Happy New Year to all.

It is pleasing to see how interRAI instruments are implemented across multiple situations which confirms the versatility of our systems.

This newsletter also includes:
  • Aged Data Compare project using the interRAI Long Term Care Facility (LTCF)
  • The “ReKo” – Regional Competence in Care in Germany
  • New release of interRAI's Long-Term Care Facilities (LTCF) Assessment System: Version 10.0 
  • interRAI Acute Care System in Australia and New Zealand
  • New and updated publications.

Professor Len Gray
Editor
Aged Care Data Compare – Data systems for improving care of older people


This two-year project commenced in June 2020 at The University of Queensland Centre for Health Services Research (https://chsr.centre.uq.edu.au/aged-care-data-compare). It is funded by the Australian Digital Health Cooperative Research Centre (DH CRC), The Bupa Health Foundation, and the Australian Department of Health (the latter two as industry partners). The Australian e-Health Research Centre is providing technical expertise and the team is working with aged care service providers, software vendors, and government.

This project aims to resolve technical challenges around the standardisation and sharing of data recorded as part of every-day practice in residential aged care. Providers gather information to judge residents’ needs, but processes vary and software solutions record items differently. In addition, sharing of this information with other health care professionals within and across health settings is limited. This leads to missed opportunities: care planning between facilities and health settings is hindered, understanding and comparing quality of care is difficult, and broader analysis by management, accreditors, and funders is challenging.

The project will use the interRAI Long Term Care Facility (LTCF) assessment system as a ‘proxy’ data standard and examine clinical concepts already embedded in existing, exemplar software systems. 

The project will utilise the FHIR® data description paradigm to promote sharing of data between organisations using different aged care information technology (IT) systems. FHIR® stands for Fast Health Interoperability Resources and is a standard for describing health data and the exchange of this data. The team will define FHIR® resources to represent assessment and clinical data, initially using definitions and elements from the interRAI LTCF dataset and produce a FHIR® implementation guide (IG) for healthcare data exchange in the aged care setting. It is hoped that these will represent an industry interoperability standard for Australia, and internationally. The team will align this work with that being conducted using the interRAI LTCF in other jurisdictions.

Australia does not have a minimum data set for long term care. This project will help to create one, potentially the LTCF, but this is not assured. From the interRAI perspective, the project will build an inter-operability toolset using the HL7-FHIR systems that will be applicable internationally. Hopefully, this work will extend to other interRAI systems, placing interRAI in a position of having not only the suite but also the capability of data exchange among software systems from EMRs to APPs. 
ChYMH-S in Simplified Chinese now published
ChYMH-S in Simplified Chinese has been published and can be found here:

The Simplified Chinese edition of the "interRAI Child and Youth Mental Health Screener (ChYMH-S)" is translated from the English standard edition of the interRAI ChYMH-S. The interRAI Child and Youth Mental Health Screener (ChYMH-S) is based on, and intended to complement, the interRAI Child and Youth Mental Health (interRAI ChYMH) assessment instrument for both in-patient and community-based populations.
Calling all interRAI fellows and data users
In collaboration with Frontiers in Psychiatry (IF 2.849 | Citescore 3.2), Professor John Hirdes, Dr. Jyrki Heikkilä, Dr. Gary Cheung and Associate Professor Jason Ferris are organizing a collection of articles (Research Topic) titled: "Innovations in the Mental Health Applications of interRAI Assessments".

The idea is to collect high-level manuscripts from international experts, who will tackle the issue from different points of view with the main aim of creating an E-Book compilation. Two core elements for manuscripts are mental health and the utilisation of interRAI assessment tools.

Manuscript contributions can be of different types: for example, original research, review, or perspective. The deadline for submissions is currently set to April 4th, 2021, although we are willing to discuss the possibility of granting extensions. Abstract submission is not compulsory, but if you have an idea please contact us. Please note that manuscripts accepted for publication are subject to publishing fees, but rest assured that the editorial office is ready to discuss with you individual solutions for these - do let us know if you would like to know more details.

Would you be interested in contributing an article? We are available to discuss with you any questions you may have about the special issue or a publication you have in mind.

Contact:
John Hirdes: [email protected]
Jyrki Heikkilä: [email protected]
Gary Cheung: [email protected]
Jason Ferris: [email protected]
PhD defence using interRAI Family Caregiver's Quality of Life questionnaire
Ilona Barańska, MPH, MSc. defended her dissertation Quality of life of family caregivers of community-dwelling older people for a master degree in sociology at Jagiellonian University in Krakow. It was prepared based on research conducted using the InterRAI Family Caregiver's Quality of life questionnaire. Ilona defended her thesis with distinction.
interRAI HC key tool in new project in Germany
The interRAI HC-Assessment is a key tool in a pilot project in the German federal state of Lower Saxony. The “ReKo” (Regional Competence in Care) will test the improvement of the situation of rural families with members needing different types of care and treatment by networking, rigorous case management, and digitalization.

Ten different institutions, including the University of Osnabrück, DAK (a Big Health Care Fund), EUREGION (a consortium of care providers), and the University hospital of Münster will collaborate in realizing this four year project which is granted by the G-BA (Federal Joint Committee) with 10 million Euros. The G-BA is the highest decision-making body of the joint self-government of physicians, dentists, hospitals, and health insurance funds in Germany. It issues directives for the benefit catalogue of the statutory health insurance funds (GKV) for more than 73 million insured persons, and thus, specifies which services in medical care are reimbursed by the GKV.

The training of the potential assessors who will carry out the interRAI HC just started online.
For more information: https://rekopflege.de/
New Release of interRAI's Long-Term Care Facilities (LTCF) Assessment System: Version 10.0 
interRAI is proud to announce the release of Version 10.0 of its Long-Term Care Facilities (LTCF) Assessment System, the manual for which is now available for purchase online at catalog.interRAI.org and the full system can be licensed for use via e-mail [email protected].

Many new items have been added, while other items have been changed or deleted. The resulting instrument is about equal in length to the prior instrument, but, as is described in the PDF (see link below), includes significant upgrades in content.

PhD Thesis on interRAI's Home Care Instrument
Dr. Lina Urbietė defended her PhD thesis on August 27 titled The Assessment of Independence of Older Patients Discharged from the Nursing Hospital to Home Care and the Continuity of Nursing Services at Home.

The following two articles were published based on her PhD.

interRAI on the move in Australia
With many hospitals in Australia and New Zealand planning to implement the interRAI Acute Care system, interRAI Australia has prepared a background paper to provide a more in depth description of the hospital systems. This paper is targeted particularly to clinicians and administrators who are not familiar with the interRAI system. The paper can be downloaded at the interRAI Australia website here: https://interrai-au.org/news/
 
A companion paper that provides similar background information to an Australian audience interested in interRAI's aged care systems can be found at the same link.
New Scales for the interRAI ChYMH and ChYMH-DD
The Instrument and Syestems Development Committee (ISD) recently approved the following three new algorithms and the School Disengagement Scale for the interRAI Child and Youth Mental Health (ChYMH) and interRAI Child and Youth Mental Health and Developmental Disability (ChYMH-DD).
  • Risk of Suicide and Self Harm in Kids (RISsK): An empirically based decision-support tool designed to indicate the risk of suicide and self-harm for children and youth between the ages of 4-18 years accessing community or facility-based mental health services.
  • Risk of Injury to Others (RIO): An empirically based decision-support tool designed to indicate the risk of injury to others for children and youth between the ages of 4-18 years accessing community or facility-based mental health services.
  • interRAI's Resource Intensity for Children and Youth Algorithm (RIChY): An empirically based decision-support tool designed to indicate the intensity and nature of service needs required for children and youth between the ages of 4-18 years accessing community or facility-based mental health services.
  • School Disengagement Scale: A scale that measures the intensity of school disengagement for children and youth between the ages of 4-18 years accessing community or facility-based mental health services.
Cognitive impairment comparison paper 
Violetta Kijowska is a PhD student who compared cognitive impairment between nursing homes and residential homes in Poland using the interRAI LTCF Suite.  

interRAI blog 
The interRAI Publications Committee has set up a blog for interRAI Fellows to highlight their publications, information, and updates about COVID-19 related efforts. You can visit the blog at this link: https://obs.com/interraiblog/ 

If you have anything that you would like posted on the blog, then please send information to Melissa Ziraldo at [email protected]
Publications






















New interRAI Publications
interRAI interRAI Child and Youth Mental Health Screener (ChYMH-S) Assessment Form and User's Manual, Simplified Chinese Edition, 9.3.1
ChYMH-S in Simplified Chinese has been published and can be found here:

The Simplified Chinese edition of the "interRAI Child and Youth Mental Health Screener (ChYMH-S)" is translated from the English standard edition of the interRAI ChYMH-S. The interRAI Child and Youth Mental Health Screener (ChYMH-S) is based on, and intended to complement, the interRAI Child and Youth Mental Health (interRAI ChYMH) assessment instrument for both in-patient and community-based populations.
interRAI Long-Term Care Facilities (LTCF) Assessment Form and User's Manual, (Standard English Edition), 10.0
The interRAI Long-Term Care Facilities (LTCF) Assessment System Version 10.0 is a comprehensive, standardized system for evaluating the needs, strengths, and preferences of persons in chronic care and nursing home institutional settings. Completing an LTCF assessment enables a health care provider to assess key domains of function, mental and physical health, social support, and service use.

This edition of this interRAI book contains English-language, country-specific examples from Canada. This book contains introductory material, an item-by-item guide for using the assessment form, a Change List outlining updates from Version 9.1.2 to Version 10.0, and the assessment form itself.
interRAI Home Care (HC) Assessment Form and User's Manual, State of Louisiana Edition, 9.4.3
The Louisiana edition of "interRAI Home Care (HC) Assessment System" has been customized for Louisiana. The interRAI HC is designed to be a user-friendly, reliable, person-centered system that informs and guides comprehensive planning of care and services for elderly and disabled persons in community-based settings around the world. It focuses on the person's functioning and quality of life by assessing needs, strengths, and preferences. It also facilitates referrals when appropriate.

When used on multiple occasions, it provides the basis for an outcome-based assessment of the person's response to care or services. The interRAI HC Assessment System can be used to assess persons with chronic needs for care, as well as with post-acute care needs (e.g., after hospitalization or in a hospital-at-home situation).
interRAI Self-Reported Quality of Life — Child and Youth Mental Health (QOL-ChYMH) Surveys and User’s Manual, (Standard English Edition), 10.0.0
This book includes both the interRAI Self-Reported Quality of Life – Child and Youth Mental Health (QOL-ChYMH) and the interRAI Family Quality of Life – Child and Youth Mental Health (FamQOL).
The interRAI Self-Reported Quality of Life – Child and Youth Mental Health (QOL-ChYMH) is a self-report survey that assesses the perception of life satisfaction and well-being of children and youth (ages 7 to 18 years) before and after receiving mental health services. The QOL-ChYMH helps to promote child and youth engagement as well as provide opportunities for children and youth to personally impact service delivery. Hearing directly from young clients can give service providers valuable information regarding areas that are specifically impacting client progress, thus allowing opportunities to respond to needs and ultimately help improve treatment outcomes.