Sbar tailored for mental health intake to improve mental health crisis triage for older adults

Mental illness is a global crisis. Unfavorable economic, social, and environmental circumstances contribute to lack of quality care in those affected by mental illness. The purpose of this quality improvement (QI) project was to determine if the addition of the Situation Background Assessment Recommendation (SBAR) tool tailored to mental health pre-screening assessment of older adults presenting to the emergency room in mental health crisis improved self-efficacy and communication between the mental health intake professionals and the psychiatrist, and increased accuracy of the preadmission assessments in the geropsychiatric unit at Matagorda Regional Medical Center. The design for this project was a non-randomized, one-group, pre-test/post-test guided design using Plan-Do-Study-Act (PDSA) cycle to improve handoff reporting from the mental health intake professional to the psychiatrist. geropsychiatric admission rate was 50% (n=24) pre-intervention and increased by 13% to 63% post-intervention (n=30). Mental health crisis triage for older adults was improved through the implementation of the SBAR tool tailored to mental health screening and the assessment.