The number of hospitalized older adults in Portugal necessitates a better understanding of the acute care environment for older adults. This study translated and examined the psychometric qualities of the Geriatric Care Environment Scale (GCES) among 1,068 Portuguese registered nurses (RNs). Four factors emerged from the exploratory factor analyses: resource availability, aging-sensitive care delivery, institutional values regarding older adults and staff, and continuity of care. The internal consistency of the GCES was . The GCES was significantly associated with the variables of region, hospital type, unit type, and RNs perception of hospital educational, staff knowledge, difficulty, rewarding, and burdensome in caring for older adults. Nurses who worked in hospitals centers in the northern region and medical and surgery units had more positive perceptions of the geriatric care environment. More positive perception was also found among RNs that reported more educational support, had more knowledge, and felt more rewarding and less difficulty and burden in caring older adults. This process resulted in a valid and reliable measurement of the geriatric care environment Portuguese version which provides hospital leadership with an instrument to evaluate organizational support for geriatric nursing practice and target specific areas that support or hinder care delivery. 1. Introduction Portugal ranks sixth in the world in terms of its aging population [1]. The 2011 census reported that approximately 19% of the Portuguese population is aged 65 or over [2], whereas they represented 41% of all hospital discharges in 2010 [3]. The average length of stay of older inpatients is 4.5 days, which is longer than inpatients less than 65 years of age (3.7 days) [4]. There is a growing international awareness that the delivery of care to hospitalized older adults is shaped by a combination of factors that includes organizational culture, resource availability, and work environment [5]. Nurses Improving Care for Healthsystem Elders (NICHE) hospitals in North America have recognized the pivotal role of the nurse in improving the hospital outcomes and experiences of older adults [6]. NICHE organizations engage nurses at all levels in multiple roles to transform the geriatric care environment through the use of evidence-based practice guidelines; staff, patient, and family education programs; and evaluation and project management tools [6]. A critical first step in developing system-level initiatives to improve the care of the older adult is the evaluation of the geriatric
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