[Healthcare without boundaries: revolution in cross-sector healthcare delivery].

Abstract

Hospital at home (HaH) is an internationally evaluated and widely established model of care in many countries. HaH is an acute clinical service that provides personnel, equipment, technology, medications, and skills that are typically available in hospitals, and delivers hospital-level care for selected individuals in their own homes or in nursing facilities. An interprofessional team consisting of nurses, therapists, and physicians treats patients-who would otherwise be cared for in a conventional hospital bed-in their own beds at home. Patients receive needs-based nursing and medical visits several times a day, and the team is available 24 h a day, 7 days a week. The average duration of treatment is similar to that of a conventional inpatient stay, ranging from 3-9 days. In current pilot projects in Switzerland, patients with internal medicine or palliative acute conditions are predominantly being treated. A Cochrane review based on 20 randomized studies on HaH shows high patient safety, lower complication rates compared to the traditional inpatient setting, lower treatment costs, and high patient satisfaction.