Home intervention by nurses cuts readmission for heart failure

Home visits from specially trained nurses can substantially reduce the risk of hospital readmission among patients with heart failure. Blue and colleagues (p 715) compared nurse intervention with usual care in 165 patients who had been admitted with left ventricular systolic dysfunction. The intervention, which aimed to improve patients' knowledge and improve monitoring and treatment of the disease, cut admissions by 39% over 12 months. The authors say that, apart from improving patients' knowledge about the condition, regular contact enables better monitoring and prompt adjustment of treatment.

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Relevant Article

Randomised controlled trial of specialist nurse intervention in heart failure

Lynda Blue, Elanor Lang, John J V McMurray, Andrew P Davie, Theresa A McDonagh, David R Murdoch, Mark C Petrie, Eugene Connolly, John Norrie, Caroline E Round, Ian Ford, and Caroline E Morrison
BMJ 2001 323: 715-718. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]