Prevalence of and Antecedents to Missing Incidents Amongst Older Adult Medic-Alert ’s Subscribers: A Retrospective Descriptive Study
ABSTRACT
Background:
With population aging the number of people living with dementia is expected to increase and consequently so is the prevalence of missing incidents due to critical wandering. However, the estimated prevalence of missing incidents due to dementia is inconclusive in some jurisdictions and overlooked in others.
Objective:
The aims of the study were to examine: (1) the demographic, psychopathological, and environmental antecedents to missing incidents due to critical wandering among older adult Canadian Medic-Alert Foundation Incorporated (herein Medic-Alert) subscribers, and (2) the characteristics and outcomes of the missing incidents.
Methods:
Retrospective descriptive design. The sample included 434 older adult Medic-Alert subscribers involved in 560 missing incidents between January 2015 to July 2021
Results:
The sample was overrepresented by Caucasian. Medic-Alert subscribers reported missing were mostly older females, living in urban areas with at least one family member. Most self-reported to be living with dementia. Medic-Alert subscribers went missing most frequently from their private homes in the community, travelling on foot and public transport, during the afternoon and evening. Most were located by first responders or Good Samaritans. From the total sample of 560 missing incidents, 22.5 % were a repeated incident. The mean time between missing incidents was 11 months. Finally, the majority of Medic-Alert subscribers returned home safely, and reports of harm, injuries and death were very low (i.e., 0.2% of cases).
Conclusions:
Missing incidents involved mostly old adults living with dementia from an urban area. Most Medic-Alert subscribers involved in missing incidents were safely returned home. This study provides prevalence of missing incidents from one database source. The low frequency of missing incidents may not represent populations that are not Caucasian. Despite the low number of incidents, of the 0.2% cases resulting in injuries or death are devastating experiences that may be mitigated through prevention strategies. Clinical Trial: NA
Citation
Request queued. Please wait while the file is being generated. It may take some time.
Copyright
© The authors. All rights reserved. This is a privileged document currently under peer-review/community review (or an accepted/rejected manuscript). Authors have provided JMIR Publications with an exclusive license to publish this preprint on it's website for review and ahead-of-print citation purposes only. While the final peer-reviewed paper may be licensed under a cc-by license on publication, at this stage authors and publisher expressively prohibit redistribution of this draft paper other than for review purposes.