Improving Hospital Care for Older Adults through Acute Care for Elders (ACE Units): A Podcast with Kellie Flood and Stephanie Rogers

Acute Care for Elders (ACE Units) have been around for over a quarter of a century. Randomized trials of ACE units date back to 1996 when Seth Landefeld and colleagues published a study in NEJM showing that they improve basic activities of daily living at discharge and can reduce the frequency of discharge to long-term care institutions.  But if ACE units are so great, why do so few hospitals have them?

On today's podcast we talk about ACE units with geriatricians Kellie Flood and Stephanie Rogers.  They recently published a paper in JAGS looking at the current landscape of ACE units in the US. In the podcast we go over these issues and more:

• What are ACE units and what structural elements go into them (see the picture below for a nice summary)? 
• Which patients are eligible to go to an ACE unit?
• What are the benefits of an ACE unit?
• If ACE units are so great, why are they not so common? 
• What does the future look like for ACE units and how does it differ (if at all) from Age Friendly Health Systems?

If you want to do a deeper dive in ACE units, check out some of the following articles:

• The original NEJM paper on ACE units from 1996
• Kellie Flood’s paper in JAMA IM showing that not only ACE units deliver better care, but also help with the hospitals bottom line