Delivering Person-Centered Care: Important Preferences for Recipients of Long-term Services and Supports

Objectives: Although assessing individual consumer preferences are an important first step in providing person-centered care, the purpose of this study was to identify the top 10 shared preferences that are important to a majority of consumers receiving long-term services and supports. Design: A cross-sectional survey design was used. Setting and participants: Preference assessment interviews were conducted with 255 nursing home (NH) residents and 528 older adults receiving home and community-based services (HCBS). Measurements: The Preferences for Everyday Living Inventory (PELI) was used to collect consumer preference information. Two versions of the PELI were used—the PELI-NH for NH residents and the PELI-HC for clients receiving HCBS and analysis focused on 41 shared items between the 2 versions. All respondents answered PELI questions independently and rated the importance of psychosocial preference items on a scale from not at all to a lot/very important. Results: Ten preferences were shared as being important or very important by NH residents and older adults receiving HCBS. Most notably, more than 90% of respondents in each group rated “having regular contact with family” as an important priority. Having privacy, choices about what to eat, when to bathe, and activity options also were important preferences for a majority (77%-93%) in both settings. Conclusion: Providers seeking to incorporate preference-based care can utilize study results as a foundation to incorporating important preferences into the care delivery process at the organizational level across care settings. For example, assessing all consumers on this core set of 10 shared preferences can assist with relationship building, transitions in care, and quality improvement. However, preferences with aggregate low-rated levels of importance in this study should not be discredited or eliminated. It is important for providers to understand the unique preference inventory of each older adult, which can then be targeted toward meeting goals for preference fulfillment. This can aid in bringing preferences into practice to improve the quality of care and quality of life to best meet the psychosocial needs of each person.