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Quality care outcomes following transitional care interventions for older people from hospital to home: a systematic review.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Provision of high quality transitional care is a challenge for health care providers in many western countries. This systematic review was conducted to (1) identify and synthesise research, using randomised control trial designs, on the quality of transitional care interventions compared with standard hospital discharge for older people with chronic illnesses, and (2) make recommendations for research and practice.

Methods

Eight databases were searched; CINAHL, Psychinfo, Medline, Proquest, Academic Search Complete, Masterfile Premier, SocIndex, Humanities and Social Sciences Collection, in addition to the Cochrane Collaboration, Joanna Briggs Institute and Google Scholar. Results were screened to identify peer reviewed journal articles reporting analysis of quality indicator outcomes in relation to a transitional care intervention involving discharge care in hospital and follow-up support in the home. Studies were limited to those published between January 1990 and May 2013. Study participants included people 60 years of age or older living in their own homes who were undergoing care transitions from hospital to home. Data relating to study characteristics and research findings were extracted from the included articles. Two reviewers independently assessed studies for risk of bias.

Results

Twelve articles met the inclusion criteria. Transitional care interventions reported in most studies reduced re-hospitalizations, with the exception of general practitioner and primary care nurse models. All 12 studies included outcome measures of re-hospitalization and length of stay indicating a quality focus on effectiveness, efficiency, and safety/risk. Patient satisfaction was assessed in six of the 12 studies and was mostly found to be high. Other outcomes reflecting person and family centred care were limited including those pertaining to the patient and carer experience, carer burden and support, and emotional support for older people and their carers. Limited outcome measures were reported reflecting timeliness, equity, efficiencies for community providers, and symptom management.

Conclusions

Gaps in the evidence base were apparent in the quality domains of timeliness, equity, efficiencies for community providers, effectiveness/symptom management, and domains of person and family centred care. Further research that involves the person and their family/caregiver in transitional care interventions is needed.

SUBMITTER: Allen J

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4147161 | biostudies-literature | 2014 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Project description:IntroductionIn Germany, an efficient and feasible transition from hospital to home for older patients, ensuring continuous care across healthcare settings, has not yet been applied and evaluated. Based on the transitional care model (TCM), this study aims to reduce preventable readmissions of patients ≥75 years of age with a transitional care intervention performed by geriatric-experienced care professionals. The study investigates whether the intervention ensures continuous care during transition and stabilises the care situation of patients at home.Methods and analysesRandomised controlled clinical trial, recruiting between 25 April 2018 and 31 December 2019 in one German hospital in the city of Regensburg. The intervention group is supported by care professionals in the transition process from hospital to home for up to 12 months. Based on TCM, the intervention includes an individual care plan according to a patient's symptoms, risks, needs and values. The plan is advanced in the domestic situation via personal visits and telephone contacts. All necessary care actions regarding, for example, mobility, residence adjustments, or nutrition, are initiated to be executed by ambulant care services, and are monitored, evaluated and adapted if necessary. In supervising the care plan, the care professionals do not administer active care services themselves but coordinate them. Patients and their caregivers are actively engaged in the care planning and execution. In contrast, the control group receives only usual discharge planning in the hospital and usual ambulatory care.The primary outcome is the all-cause readmission rate assessed using health insurance data within a follow-up of up to 12 months after hospital discharge. Secondary outcomes include care quality, mobility, nutritional and wound situation, and health-related quality of life. They are assessed at baseline, after 1 month, 3 months, 6 months, and at the end of study visit. Additionally, the economic efficiency of the intervention will be evaluated.Ethics and disseminationEthics approval for the trial was obtained from the Ethics Committee of the Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg. Results will be published in peer-reviewed, open-access scientific journals and disseminated at national and international research conferences and through public presentations in the geriatric and healthcare community.Trial registrationClinicalTrials.gov identifier: NCT03513159.

Project description:IntroductionFaced with costly hospital readmissions of increasingly complex patient populations, transitional care is a priority throughout Ontario, Canada; yet, rural patients have significantly more hospital readmissions and emergency department visits during the first 30 days following hospitalisation than urban patients. Because transitional care (TC) was designed and evaluated with urban patients, addressing urban-rural disparities in TC effectiveness requires increasing the alignment of TC with the needs of patients and families in rural communities and the rural nursing practice context. The study objectives are to (1) determine the perceived acceptability of evidence-based TC interventions targeting postdischarge care management to patients, families and nurses and (2) adapt the interventions to patients' and families' needs and the rural nursing practice context.Methods and analysisThis multimethod study has two phases. In phase I, 32-48 patients and families will rate their level of preparedness for discharge and the acceptability of evidence-based TC interventions. Participants will be engaged in semi-structured interviews about their care management needs, their perspectives on the interventions in fitting those needs and in providing suggestions for adapting the interventions to fit their needs. TC interventions perceived as acceptable to patients and families will be examined in phase II. In phase II, 32-48 hospital and home care nurses will rate the acceptability of the interventions identified by patients and families and attend focus group discussions on the feasibility of providing the interventions. Phase I and II data will be analysed using descriptive statistics and qualitative content analysis.Ethics and disseminationEthics approval was obtained from the Research Ethics Board at York University and participating hospital sites. Findings will be communicated through plain language fact sheets, policy briefs, press-releases and peer-reviewed conference presentations and manuscripts.

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Project description:BackgroundTransitional hospital-to-home care programs support safe and timely transition from acute care settings back into the community. Case-mix systems that classify transitional care clients into groups based on their resource utilization can assist with care planning, calculating reimbursement rates in bundled care funding models, and predicting health human resource needs. This study evaluated the fit and relevance of the Resource Utilization Groups version III for Home Care (RUG-III/HC) case-mix classification system in transitional care programs in Ontario, Canada.MethodsWe conducted a retrospective analysis of clinical assessment data and administrative billing records from a cohort of clients (n = 1,680 care episodes) in transitional home care programs in Ontario. We classified care episodes into established RUG-III/HC groups based on clients' clinical and functional characteristics and calculated four case-mix indices to describe care relative resource utilization in the study sample. Using these indices in linear regression models, we evaluated the degree to which the RUG-III/HC system can be used to predict care resource utilization.ResultsA majority of transitional home care clients are classified as being Clinically complex (41.6%) and having Reduced physical functions (37.8%). The RUG-III/HC groups that account for the largest share of clients are those with the lowest hierarchical ranking, indicating low Activities of Daily Living limitations but a range of Instrumental Activities of Daily Living limitations. There is notable heterogeneity in the distribution of clients in RUG-III/HC groups across transitional care programs. The case-mix indices reflect decreasing hierarchical resource use within but not across RUG-III/HC categories. The RUG-III/HC predicts 23.34% of the variance in resource utilization of combined paid and unpaid care time.ConclusionsThe distribution of clients across RUG-III/HC groups in transitional home care programs is remarkably different from clients in long-stay home care settings. Transitional care programs have a higher proportion of Clinically complex clients and a lower proportion of clients with Reduced physical function. This study contributes to the development of a case-mix system for clients in transitional home care programs which can be used by care managers to inform planning, costing, and resource allocation in these programs.