The aim of the study is to identify criteria that frail elderly patients refer to when they appreciate the quality of care of Geriatric assessment units. Twenty-one patients recently released from six Geriatric assessment units in Montreal participated in face-to-face interviews (n = 17) or in a Focus Group (n = 4). Patients reported 56 different criteria grouped into four main dimensions of quality: the environment of care, the attitude and the technical competence of professionals and the results of care. The environment of care consists of physical resources and person related qualities. Comments on the attitude and the technical competence of professionals related mostly to the nurses and physicians. Some quality criteria reported by elderly patients are similar to those reported by patients in various acute care units while others are specific to the frailty of their condition. This study provides health care professionals with rich and useful information on how elderly patients perceive the quality of various components of care in Geriatric assessment units.

The goal of this study is to develop and validate a tool for measuring perceptions of caregivers of the quality of care and services in Geriatric Assessment Units. It has been designed so as to reproduce the notion of quality for caregivers. The validation of the tool is based on analyses of responses provided by caregivers (n = 274) to questions of perceived quality and to a certain number of questions necessary for the evaluation of its metric qualities. The measurement scale developed includes 25 items and it demonstrates good internal consistency. The Alpha Cronbach coefficients are 0.95 for the global index and they range from 0.88 to 0.91 on the sub-scales. The various analyses support a three-dimensional structure of the notion of quality for caregivers, explaining 66 per cent of the total variance. These dimensions are: “exchanges with professionals on the relative's condition,” “care given to a loved one,” and “planning the discharge”. It is hoped that this tool will promote the inclusion of the points of view of caregivers in the process of the improvement and assessment of quality.

Until now, family caregivers have been involved very little in the processes of assessing the quality of care delivered to a hospitalized relative. This study is the second phase of a broader research project whose aim is to develop measurement scales intended for elderly patients and their caregivers on their perceptions of the quality of services delivered in Geriatric Assessment Units. More specifically, the goal of this phase of the research is to document the criteria that caregivers use to judge the quality of these services: these criteria should constitute the content of the measurement scale that is intended for them. Four focus groups, bringing together 21 caregivers, allowed for the identification of 31 criteria of quality. These criteria have been classified according to six dimensions of quality: information, communication, attitude of staff, technical quality, continuity, and physical resources. The study highlights the dual concerns of participants: the well-being of the patient and support for caregivers. It shows that caregivers consider themselves to be clients of geriatric services.