This scoping review aimed to explore the characteristics, strengths, and gaps in research conducted in Brazilian long-term care facilities (LTCFs) for older adults. Electronic searches investigating the residents (≥60 years old), their families, and the LTCF workforce in Brazil were conducted in Medline, EMBASE, LILACS, and Google Scholar, within the timescale of 1999 to 2018, limited to English, Portuguese, or Spanish. The reference lists were hand searched for additional papers. The Mixed Methods Appraisal Tool (MMAT) was used for critical appraisal of evidence. Data were reported descriptively considering the study design, using content analysis: 327 studies were included (n = 159 quantitative non-randomized, n = 82 quantitative descriptive, n = 67 qualitative, n = 11 mixed methods, n = 6 randomized controlled trials, and n = 2 translation of assessment tools). Regardless of the study design, most were conducted in a single LTCF (45.8%), in urban locations (84.3%), and in non-profit settings (38.7%). The randomized trials and descriptive studies presented the lowest methodological quality based on the MMAT. This is the first review to provide an overview of research on LTCFs for older people in Brazil. It illustrates an excess of small-scale, predominantly qualitative papers, many of which are reported in ways that do not allow the quality of the work to be assured.
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A total of 512 publications were retrieved. A further 12 articles were identified during the secondary screening of the references. After deleting duplicates, 438 studies were assessed for eligibility. Ninety-nine papers were excluded, yielding 327 studies that were included.
Figure 1.
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Table 1.
Qualitative (n = 67) | Descriptive (n = 82) | Non-Randomized (n = 159) | RCT (n = 6) | Mixed Methods (n = 11) | |
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Publication Date |
Figure 2.
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Table 2.
Qualitative (n = 67) | Descriptive (n = 82) | Non-Randomized (n = 159) | RCT (n = 6) | Mixed Methods (n = 11) |
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Type of setting | 1999–2009 | 11 (16.4%) | 19 (23.1%) | 24 (15.1%) | 1 (16.6%) | |||||
Profit | 5 (45.5%) | |||||||||
2 (3.0%) |
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Supplementary Materials (Table S1)
Table 3.
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