Development of tools to measure dignity for older people in acute hospitals

Background Dignity is a concept that applies to all patients. Older patients can be particularly vulnerable to experiencing a loss of dignity in hospital. Previous tools developed to measure dignity have been aimed at palliative and end‐of‐life care. No tools for measuring dignity in acute hospital care have been reported. Objectives To develop tools for measuring patient dignity in acute hospitals. Setting A large UK acute hospital. We purposively selected 17 wards where at least 50% of patients are 65 years or above. Methods Three methods of capturing data related to dignity were developed: an electronic patient dignity survey (possible score range 6–24); a format for nonparticipant observations; and individual face‐to‐face semi‐structured patient and staff interviews (reported elsewhere). Results A total of 5,693 surveys were completed. Mean score increased from 22.00 pre‐intervention to 23.03 after intervention (p