Establishing an evaluation system for the disabled elderly in home health care services in Beijing

Objective To establish the evaluation system of home health care services for the disabled elderly for promoting the community health service institutions in Beijing to provide home health care services for the disabled elderly. Methods Based on the research of the policy documents, documents and mature evaluation tools, the paper preliminarily draws up the item pool of evaluation indexes and designs the expert consultation table. A total of 15 experts, including geriatricians, general practitioners and community nurses, who were experienced in home health care services or comprehensive elderly assessment in nationwide were invited to participate two rounds of Delphi consultation to determine the evaluation system from January to May 2019. Results The expert consultation forms were all recalled and valid. The active coefficient of experts of Delphi consultation in two rounds were 100.0%, and the degree of specialist authority was between 0.700 and 0.942, with an average of 0.847, reaching the acceptable standard. The coefficient of concordance of importance and feasibility were 0.172 and 0.207 respectively(all P<0.001) in the first round of consultation, and the second round were 0.301 and 0.314 respectively(all P<0.001). The expert opinions tended to be consistent and the consultation results were reliable. The final evaluation system included 6 first-class indexes and 28 second-class indexes, including service safety, general physical condition, cognitive and mental state, physical function, ability of daily living and environment and resources. Conclusion The experts have great initiative and authority on research subjects. After two rounds of consultation, the experts` opinion tend to be consistent and have enough coordination. The evaluation system of home health care service for the disabled elderly in this study is credible.