HOSPITAL SERVICES REPORT : HOSPITAL IN THE HOME EVALUATION - MAR97
Evaluation of the Hospital in the Home Program
KPMG Management Consulting Pty Ltd have recently completed a comprehensive independent evaluation of the Hospital in the Home program.
The Hospital in the Home program aims to:
- encourage providers of acute health services to develop new approaches to service delivery which facilitate reduced length of stay and ensure appropriate home based acute care services; and
- improve access to, and enhance the quality of, acute care services for the Victorian community.
The evaluation sought to:
- describe the nature of projects funded, their patients, and the nature of care provided;
- assess the costs of HITH care in comparison to care provided in an acute hospital setting;
- assess the adequacy of home based care provided;
- measure the level of patient and carer satisfaction; and
- through the information gained from the evaluation, make recommendations to the Department on future service and funding policy for home based acute care.
Detailed below are some of the evaluation’s highlights:
- Over the course of the two year pilot period, funded projects provided almost 10,000 episodes of acute home based care.
- The HITH program has replaced the need for admission to a hospital bed in 76% of all episodes provided by HITH projects. The remaining 24% were treated at home for part of their acute episode.
- The most common treatments provided through HITH care during the study period were intravenous antibiotic therapy, post surgical care, non surgical wound care and chemotherapy.
- Predicted clinical outcomes were achieved in 93% of HITH cases.
- 97% of patients receiving HITH care were “very satisfied” with the care they received in HITH.
- 92% of patients said they would use HITH again if they got sick.
Health professionals associated with HITH care believed that HITH care assisted patients to get better faster, allowed the delivery of high quality care and was preferred by patients.
Common HITH Treatments
