Rural Trial Finds Hospital-at-Home Boosts Patient Experience With Comparable Safety

Overview

• A randomized controlled trial of 161 adults at rural sites in Illinois, Kentucky, and Alberta compared home hospital care with standard inpatient care for common acute conditions.
• Patients treated at home reported a net promoter score of 88.4 versus 45.5 in hospital and took roughly 700 to 714 more steps per day.
• Safety results, including 30-day readmissions, were comparable between the home and hospital groups.
• Overall costs were similar, but moving patients home within two to three days lowered total costs by about 27%, and home-care days cost roughly 50% less per day than hospital days.
• Refusal to enroll was 31% compared with 63% in prior urban trials, and care relied on compact remote monitoring, ambulatory infusion pumps, and point-of-care labs, with a mobile electric-vehicle clinic now in development.