JMIR Publications

ABSTRACT

Background:

Due to the demographic changes in the elderly population worldwide, delivering coordinated care at home to multimorbid older adults is of great importance. Older adults living with multiple chronic conditions need information to manage and coordinate their care. eHealth can be effective for gaining sufficient information, communication, and self-management of chronic conditions for the elderly. There is a need for more knowledge on how multimorbid older adults participate in coordinating their care and for a better understanding of how eHealth supports their participation.

Objective:

This study aims to 1) gain knowledge on multimorbid older adults’ experiences with participation in care coordination with the general practitioner (GP) and district nurses (DNs), and 2) explore how eHealth supports their participation in care coordination.

Methods:

The study has a qualitative explorative approach. Data collection included semi-structured interviews with 20 older adults with multimorbidity receiving primary care services from their GPs and DNs. The participants were included by their GP or a nurse at a local inter-municipal acute inpatient care (AIC) unit. The data analysis was guided by systematic text condensations (STC).

Results:

We identified two categories: 1) Older adults in charge of and using eHealth to coordinate their care, 2) older adults with a loss of control to coordinate their care. The first category describes how communication with the GP and DNs can facilitate participation, the importance of managing own medication, and how eHealth can support older adults' information needs. The second category focuses on older adults who depend on guidance from their GP and DNs to manage their health, describing how lack of the capacity to be involved in information sharing makes these adults lose control of their care coordination.

Conclusions:

Being in charge of care coordination is important for the elderly. Future research should lead to understanding of electronic information sharing among healthcare providers, as older adults experience a lack of involvement in the information sharing, which hampers participation. The results show that older adults are willing to use eHealth to be informed and seek information, which enables participation in care coordination.