To determine the diagnostic accuracy of state, minimally invasive clinical and physical signs (or sets of signs) to be used as screening tests for detecting impending or current water-loss dehydration, or both, in older people by systematically reviewing studies that have measured a reference standard and at least one index test in people aged 65 years and over. 1 Clinical and physical signs for identification of impending and current water-loss dehydration in older people (Protocol)

One billion of the world’s population has hypertension, resulting in four million deaths per year. Data on the prevalence of hypertension in the Arab world are very limited. This review summarizes existing knowledge regarding prevalence, awareness, and control of hypertension in Arab countries. The PubMed, Cochrane Library, Scopus, and CINAHL databases were searched for publications on HTN among Arab people from 1980 to January 2011. Only 13 studies were identified in the literature from 10 Arab countries. The overall estimated prevalence of hypertension was 29.5% (n = 45 379), which indicates a higher prevalence of hypertension among Arabs compared to people from the USA (28%) and sub-Saharan African (27.6%). Awareness of hypertension was reported for 46% of the studies and varied from 18% (Jordan) to 79.8% (Syria). The control rate varied from 56% (Tunisia) to 92% (Egypt and Syria). The prevalence of hypertension was found to increase with age, occurring more frequently in Arab women.

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The authors used a quasi-experimental treatment and control group design with 49 participants from four nursing homes to test the effectiveness of an 8-week hydration intervention in reducing hydration-linked events (HLEs). A Kaplan Meier survival curve with log rank test was calculated to determine incidence and time to occurrence of a HLE. Incidence of and time to a HLE did not differ between the treatment and control groups over an 8-week period (p > .05). However, treatment group participants were found to be more frail, more cognitively impaired and more at risk for acute confusion than the control group participants. Although there were no statistically significant differences between the groups, it is clinically significant that the frailer, more at-risk participants in the treatment group had a lower incidence of HLEs.

Conducting intervention research in nursing home (NH) settings is particularly challenging because of the advanced age and frailty of the participants and the characteristics of the setting itself. The purpose of this project was to better understand the barriers and facilitators to the research process in NHs. Three primary data sources were used: investigator field notes, guided interviews with the research team and NH staff members, and research assistant (RA) e-mail communications. Data were analyzed using qualitative content and matrix analytic techniques. Barriers to the research process were largely congruent with previously identified NH staff characteristics, such as lack of communication between NH staff and the research team ineffective nursing leadership, decreased staff-to-resident ratios, and high turnover of NH staff. Research facilitators emerged in two overlapping areas, intraresearch team issues such as the flexibility and compatibility of the RAs, effective NH staff-to-research team communication, and the presence of an effective nurse leader in the NH.