Hospital at Home Is Supported by a Randomized Trial

Providing hospital-level acute care for select patients at their homes — hospital-at-home (HaH) — has not been studied in randomized, controlled trials. Investigators at Boston's Brigham and Women's Hospital and Faulkner Hospital (a smaller community hospital in the same healthcare system) randomized 91 emergency department (ED) patients slated for non–intensive care unit hospital admission to receive either traditional inpatient hospital care or acute care at home, which included daily nurse and physician visits, intravenous medications, point-of-care testing, remote monitoring, and video communication. Patients at high risk for clinical deterioration based on validated algorithms were excluded. Approximately 80% of included patients were …