What is your research about?
- My research is about factors explaining emergency care use in older people. I examined factors measured at individual level (e.g., person’s health status, care use) and contextual factors at the aggregate level (e.g., social care expenditures in a municipality, proportion of older people in the population of a municipality).
What are your most important findings?
- Emergency care use in older adults is driven by need for care. In addition to poor health status, older persons living at home and receiving home help for instrumental services and personal care were more likely to visit emergency care and revisit emergency care within 30 days.
Another important finding was that older people who were discharged home instead of being admitted to inpatient care from the emergency department were at higher risk of emergency care revisit within 30 days of the initial visit. This result suggests that needs of care and post-discharge care were unmet.
Previous research on emergency care has primarily focused on individual level factors. In this thesis, greater proportions of persons 80 years or older in the total population and shorter distance to the emergency department increased the risk of emergency visits. To understand emergency care use in older people we must thus consider the context in which people live.
What will you do now in your professional life?
- My plans are to continue in academia. Research is important for gaining empirical knowledge and improve the evidence-based for how care can meet people’s needs. Furthermore, I find great potential of learning in conducting research and in teaching courses.
What has being a part of SWEAH meant to you?
- Being a part of SWEAH, I got the opportunity of collaboration and networking with PhD students conducting research in gerontology in different universities of Sweden. Courses in the curriculum of SWEAH are very relevant and important for a person engaged in research related to older people. I find course ‘Theories of ageing’ very useful while selecting and adapting conceptual framework of my thesis. Furthermore, PhD days and SWEAH conferences has been a great platform for learning and networking. I would also like to appreciate financial support offered by SWEAH in participating courses, conferences, and activities related to ageing and health.
