Clinical Tools

As patients begin recovery from active cancer treatment and look toward returning to daily life, they and their families may have many questions about the best ways to recuperate and heal.

The Looking Forward kit is a series of booklets offering information, support and resources for patients completing active cancer treatment. It was developed in collaboration with people who have experienced cancer, along with health professionals and scientists.

Please read chapter 1 first: it will help you identify your needs and guide you to where you will find the information you are looking for in the rest of the booklets.

Delirium Index

The Delirium Index is an instrument for measuring the severity of symptoms of delirium, based solely upon observation of the individual patient, without additional information from family members, nursing staff, or the patient’s medical chart.

Delirium prevention in long-term care

The Delirium Prevention Program was developed for nurses and nursing aids who work in long-term care centres. It brings together a series of integrated nursing tools to reduce the incidence of delirium among cognitively impaired residents.

The core tool of the program is the decision tree. Its first part, the delirium risk screening tool, comprises five items that nursing staff can complete quickly, and identifies residents at increased risk. Its second part, the evaluation of modifiable risk factors, is completed only for those residents; the evaluation and intervention guide accompanies this step and suggests interventions to reduce the four factors.

A PowerPoint presentation accompanies the program, to train nurses and nursing aids on its implementation. Each slide includes a suggested script in its notes, which the trainer may use. The report on the development of the nursing tools sets out the evidence base for the program and the conditions for implementing it.

The EASI© was developed to raise a doctor’s suspicion about elder abuse to a level at which it might be reasonable to propose a referral for further evaluation by social services, adult protective services, or equivalents.

The EASI© has been translated into 17 languages, each with its own publication. McGill University’s Department of Family Medicine maintains an extensive description of the tool and its off-spring — EASI-sa, EASI-ltc, EASI-leo —, its linguistic versions, its related publications, and instructions for getting consent for use.