A systematic mapping review of Randomized Controlled Trials (RCTs) in care homes

Background A thorough understanding of the literature generated from research in care homes is required to support evidence-based commissioning and delivery of healthcare. So far this research has not been compiled or described. We set out to describe the extent of the evidence base derived from randomized controlled trials conducted in care homes. Methods A systematic mapping review was conducted of the randomized controlled trials (RCTs) conducted in care homes. Medline was searched for “Nursing Home”, “Residential Facilities” and “Homes for the Aged”; CINAHL for “nursing homes”, “residential facilities” and “skilled nursing facilities”; AMED for “Nursing homes”, “Long term care”, “Residential facilities” and “Randomized controlled trial”; and BNI for “Nursing Homes”, “Residential Care” and “Long-term care”. Articles were classified against a keywording strategy describing: year and country of publication; randomization, stratification and blinding methodology; target of intervention; intervention and control treatments; number of subjects and/or clusters; outcome measures; and results. Results 3226 abstracts were identified and 291 articles reviewed in full. Most were recent (median age 6 years) and from the United States. A wide range of targets and interventions were identified. Studies were mostly functional (44 behaviour, 20 prescribing and 20 malnutrition studies) rather than disease-based. Over a quarter focussed on mental health. Conclusions This study is the first to collate data from all RCTs conducted in care homes and represents an important resource for those providing and commissioning healthcare for this sector. The evidence-base is rapidly developing. Several areas - influenza, falls, mobility, fractures, osteoporosis – are appropriate for systematic review. For other topics, researchers need to focus on outcome measures that can be compared and collated.

Results: 3226 abstracts were identified and 291 articles reviewed in full. Most were recent (median age 6 years) and from the United States. A wide range of targets and interventions were identified. Studies were mostly functional (44 behaviour, 20 prescribing and 20 malnutrition studies) rather than disease-based. Over a quarter focussed on mental health. Conclusions: This study is the first to collate data from all RCTs conducted in care homes and represents an important resource for those providing and commissioning healthcare for this sector. The evidence-base is rapidly developing. Several areas -influenza, falls, mobility, fractures, osteoporosisare appropriate for systematic review. For other topics, researchers need to focus on outcome measures that can be compared and collated.

Background
Care homes provide accommodation, together with nursing or personal care, for persons who are or have been ill, who have or have had a mental disorder, who are disabled or infirm, or are or have been dependent on alcohol or drugs [1]. In the UK, 91 % of residents are over 70 years of age, 76 % require assistance with mobility or are immobile and 78 % have at least one form of mental impairment [2].
In some countries, such as the Netherlands and USA, health care professionals are based within, or employed by, care homes [3][4][5]. In others, such as the UK or Ireland, the health care provision for care homes is provided by generic primary care services. The provision of health care to this sector is a matter of concern, debate and innovation [4][5][6][7][8].
Quest for Quality, a document by the British Geriatrics Society [6], stated that health care for care homes in the UK was characterised by "unmet need, unacceptable variation and often poor quality of care". To improve matters, the report recommended the development of a more structured and evidence-based approach to commissioning. To inform this process, we set out to describe the extent of the evidence-base for the effectiveness of interventions specific to care home residents. We chose a systematic mapping review because these are specifically designed to describe the extent of research in a field [7,8]. We chose to review only

Results
The abstracts of the 3226 unique citations identified from the search were examined, 331 of which described RCTs in care homes. Forty of these were excluded at full review leaving 291 articles in this review. A PRISMA flow diagram is shown in Figure 1.
The majority of studies (145) were conducted in the USA, followed by the UK (24) and the Netherlands (23): 163 articles came from the Americas, 87 articles from Europe, 23 from Asia and 16 from Australasia. Figure 2, showing the publication rate by year, demonstrates a steady increase in the number of publications over the last two decades. The median age of the publications was 6 years.
Key methodological attributes of the studies are outlined in Table 1. 36 primary targets for interventions were identified, as summarised in Table 2.
Studies targeting quality of life were heterogeneous. Under this heading, studies evaluating psychological or behavioural interventions evaluated group or individual therapies to build self-esteem [113,114] or reminiscence therapy [115,116]. Occupational therapy-oriented studies to improve quality of life evaluated spectacle correction of eyesight, engagement in teaching and pets [117][118][119]. Physical therapy studies to improve quality of life evaluated tai chi, back rubs and functional incidental training [120][121][122]. Staff training interventions to improve quality of life evaluated teaching about endof-life care, dementia management and conflict resolution [123][124][125].
Oral health studies predominantly evaluated the role of mouthwashes, toothpastes and other oral preparations in dental hygiene [161,162,165,166,169] but also evaluated toothbrushing technologies and techniques [164,170,171], oral healthcare education [168,172], restorative dentistry [163] and denture care [167]. One study evaluated subantimicrobial doses of an antibiotic as a treatment for chronic periodontitis [173].
The majority of studies that evaluated falls prevention interventions focussed on multifaceted programmes [174][175][176][177][178][179]. Two studies evaluated the role of vitamin D supplementation [180,181] and two evaluated exercise therapy [182,183]. One evaluated the role of care home governance in falls documentation [184] and one evaluated the impact of staff education on falls rates [185].
Studies targeting quality of care focussed predominantly on care home administration: four examined quality assurance programmes [189][190][191][192], two the implementation of advanced care planning or advanced directives [186,187], one communication with families [188] and one resident relocation [193]. The remaining studies evaluated the impact of staff education on bathing [194], communication [195] and death and dying [196].
Of the less frequently studied areas, large cohorts were seen in studies targeting fractures and osteoporosis. These areas were also notable for the similarity of the interventions studied and outcome measures recorded: all eight fracture studies evaluated hip protectors [225][226][227][228][229][230][231][232] and four [248][249][250][251] out of seven osteoporosis studies evaluated calcium and vitamin D therapy, with or without bisphosphonates, whilst a further study evaluated alendronate as a standalone therapy [247].
Ten studies evaluated case management in the care home setting. The effect of psychiatric case management was evaluated in six studies, two on behavioural disturbance [49,51], two on depression [51,146] and two on quality of life [128,197]. Four studies evaluated broader assessment and management taking account of somatic, psychological and environmental issues, which might be termed comprehensive geriatric assessment [48,254,255,287]. One study evaluated protocol-driven disease management for COPD by care home nurses [292].

Conclusions
These findings provide a unique resource for those providing health care to the care home sector, collating for the first time the range of interventions and outcomes that have been tested using RCTs specifically in care homes. There have been a considerable number of RCTs of interventions specifically in care homes (292 between 1974 and 2009). These studies are relatively recent, since half of them were published in the last 6 years. They evaluated a diverse range of interventions such as light therapy, staff training and oral hygiene and an equally diverse range of targets such as reducing falls, increasing weight or improving mood. The studies were mostly functional (44 behaviour studies, 20 prescribing studies, 20 malnutrition studies) rather than disease based (1 study each for UTI and COPD). Over a quarter of papers focussed on mental health or behaviour. Despite our use of systematic searching, we found no previously published studies that had collated this literature.
A limitation of this review is the geographical distribution of papers, with the majority of studies arising from the USA and relatively few from non-English speaking nations, thus reducing the generalisability of the findings worldwide. Our decision to select only RCTs means that we have not collated the entire evidence base for interventions in care homes and are likely to have missed several important studies as a consequence. Such studies would include those focussing on policy, facility organizational characteristics and the ways in which care homes interact with other care services, including the health servicethese have been recognised to be important drivers of care quality but have been studied by means other than RCT [6].
It is possible that staff trained in the care home setting as some doctors are in the Netherlands or USAare aware of many of these studies but it is less likely that those who provide health care to care homes as part of generic primary care will be familiar with them. The recent growth in the number of papers means that even health care professionals with an interest in the area will be out of date if they have not recently consulted the literature. The wide-ranging nature of the studies identified will have relevance to commissioners, and health care professions including general practitioners, geriatricians, psychiatrists, nurses, occupational, physio-and speech and language therapists, dieticians, dentists, pharmacists and social workersas well as care home   Care home administration [186][187][188][189][190][191][192][193] 8 10417 Staff education [194][195][196] 3 1338 Case management [197] 1 192 Urinary incontinence 12 896 Occupational therapy, aids and appliances [198][199][200][201][202][203]  staff. From a research perspective, there were few targets where multiple studies evaluated similar interventions against a common outcome measure. The obvious exceptions were influenza, falls, mobility, fractures and osteoporosis and these areas are suitable for systematic reviewing. There was great diversity of interventions and targets, such that there were few papers using the same intervention and the same target. Thus, despite the large numbers of papers found, much work remains to be done to develop a robust evidence-base for each intervention and each target. Although a detailed methodological critique is beyond the scope of a systematic mapping review, the fact that the majority of studies were unblinded and did not employ cluster randomization means that many will have been methodologically flawed. In summary, these findings represent an important resource for commissioners, clinicians and researchers involved with care homes. At the very least, the diversity of interventions and outcomes illustrated should challenge nihilism towards this health care sector and encourage further innovation.  (7):520-525.