Article type
Year
Abstract
Background: The number of elderly people, and their need for long term care (LTC), is increasing in China. China lacks skilled caregivers to face the increasing burden and special challenges.
Objectives: To summarize evidence from, and assess the quality of, published systematic reviews evaluating the long-term care strategies for elderly people, and to provide the optimal policy options for healthcare of elderly people in China.
Methods: We identified systematic reviews of randomised controlled trials or observational studies published in English and Chinese that evaluated the effectiveness of long-term care strategies for elderly people. We first searched the Health System Evidence (HSE), Epistemonikos Database, the Cochrane Library, MEDLINE, Embase, Web of Science, OVID EBM Reviews, the Campbell Library, CBM, CNKI and WanFang Data databases, and also handsearched the reference lists of the papers we found. The methodological quality of systematic reviews was independently assessed by two reviewers using the AMSTAR (A MeaSurement Tool to Assess systematic Reviews) checklist. After group discussion, we provided the optimal policy options for elderly people in China.
Results: We identified 4838 publications, of which 40 systematic reviews met our inclusion criteria. We provided four policy options based on 16 reviews after group discussion. One of the four policy options was: to choose an appropriate long-term care strategy according to specific situations. We will report other options at the 24th Cochrane Colloquium.
Conclusions: Policy makers can make use of the results of overviews of systematic reviews to make effective policies on long-term care strategies for elderly people. Also, they should consider the potential implementation barriers by reviewing the literature and conducting policy dialogue.
Objectives: To summarize evidence from, and assess the quality of, published systematic reviews evaluating the long-term care strategies for elderly people, and to provide the optimal policy options for healthcare of elderly people in China.
Methods: We identified systematic reviews of randomised controlled trials or observational studies published in English and Chinese that evaluated the effectiveness of long-term care strategies for elderly people. We first searched the Health System Evidence (HSE), Epistemonikos Database, the Cochrane Library, MEDLINE, Embase, Web of Science, OVID EBM Reviews, the Campbell Library, CBM, CNKI and WanFang Data databases, and also handsearched the reference lists of the papers we found. The methodological quality of systematic reviews was independently assessed by two reviewers using the AMSTAR (A MeaSurement Tool to Assess systematic Reviews) checklist. After group discussion, we provided the optimal policy options for elderly people in China.
Results: We identified 4838 publications, of which 40 systematic reviews met our inclusion criteria. We provided four policy options based on 16 reviews after group discussion. One of the four policy options was: to choose an appropriate long-term care strategy according to specific situations. We will report other options at the 24th Cochrane Colloquium.
Conclusions: Policy makers can make use of the results of overviews of systematic reviews to make effective policies on long-term care strategies for elderly people. Also, they should consider the potential implementation barriers by reviewing the literature and conducting policy dialogue.