Conversations In Complexity

Jon Glasby in interview with Ross Upshur, discusses his research focused on understanding and responding to “inappropriate” emergency hospital admissions of older people. In the interview, he discusses how his research took up the challenge of hospital admissions of frail older people with multiple chronic conditions and how many of the admissions could be prevented. His work expands the debate from merely one of how to allocate scarce resources in hospital settings to one of organizing better, not “appropriate” care for older patients in alternative settings closer to their homes. This fascinating discussion covers topics such as delayed hospital discharge, the notion of the “deep hospital” and “preventable moments”. Using different sources of evidence from his work with patients and front-life staff, from admission data to real patient narratives, he makes a powerful case of the need for culture change in the health and social system, attitudes to care for the elderly, and how we can learn from patients