the Role of Technology in Elderly Patients

Starting from December 2019, the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Corona Virus-2 (SARS-COV-2) disease spread rapidly from China into the world, with about two Mio cases confirmed around the world. In Switzerland, more than 26'000 cases have been confirmed so far, and health authorities declared in March the needs for social isolation and have banned visits to hospitalized patients and to nursing home residents. Loneliness and isolation is a significant concern for the elderly patients as well as for their families that may significantly affect physical and mental health in both. SILVER aims to evaluate the role of programmed video calls with families: * on mood, anxiety, fear of death and pain perception in patients hospitalized or in nursing homes during the SARS-COV-2 pandemic. * in relieving the familiar caregiver anxiety and fear of death of others * in relieving the professional caregiver anxiety. SILVER is an international study involving both acute, rehabilitation geriatric units and nursing homes; we will enroll all the patients present in the participating centers. Patients will be allowed to chose between video and phone calls, the following dimensions will be evaluated: * Delirium risk: using the Confusion Assessment Method (CAM) * Mood: using the 5-item Geriatric Depression Scale (GDS) * Anxiety: using the Clinical Anxiety Scale (GAS). * Fear of death (self and others): using the Collett-Lester scale. In parallel, health professionals and family caregivers will be evaluated for anxiety at baseline and every week after intervention set-up by the Clinical Anxiety Scale (CAS). Family caregivers will also be evaluated with the fear of death scale (sub-scale fear of death of others). Finally, to evaluate the appreciation for video call communication in patients and caregivers we will use a Likert scale.