Frailty Assessment Area (FAA)

When frail older people attend ED they present unique challenges to the reviewing doctors and as a consequence are frequently admitted. Once admitted, these patients’ muscles will often rapidly waste causing them to become more dependent and significantly increasing their therapy needs, their need for rehabilitation and long term care.

To reduce this risk for these patients attending ED, a Frailty Assessment Area (FAA) was opened at Warwick Hospital to identify frailty patients quickly and start their treatment earlier.

The service works collaboratively with West Midlands Ambulance Service (WMAS), community services, primary care on a range of projects to ensure appropriate patient referrals. Since opening, the unit has successfully introduced new pathways and practices to keep elderly and frail patients out of hospital, if hospital isn’t the appropriate place for their needs. This ensures people are cared for in the right place.

Frailty phone initiative:

This enables WMAS when attending to a patient to call a frailty consultant based at Warwick Hospital to discuss the best possible care setting for the patient. This means if hospital care is not thought to be needed, our Trust’s Community Response Team will go out into the community and provide hospital standard care in a patient’s home environment. If hospital care is thought to be required following the triage call, WMAS will bring the patient directly to FAA – bypassing ED. This is also the case if the Community Response Team believe a patient requires hospital care following assessment in the patient’s home. The ethos of this service is to ensure people are cared for in the right place.

Location and contact number:

The unit is located along the same corridor as Nicholas and Fairfax wards at Warwick Hospital. The service can be contacted by calling 01926 495321 ext 8658.

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