Secrets to a Successful Home Hospital Program

Recently, Dr. David Levine, MD, MA piloted a Brigham and Women’s home hospital program in Boston, MA, with the goal of bringing acute care into the home for patients. By leveraging highly monitored and coordinated communication – enabled by Everbridge CareConverge – between physicians, in-home caregivers and patients, the home hospital pilot program proved beneficial for both the healthcare system and patients. Dr. Levine shares in-depth details about the program in a 45-minute webinar, but he also provided some of these key insights: Program Takeaways:

• According to Dr. Levine, the biggest challenge prior to developing the program was gaining Institutional buy-in.
• One of the most remarkable outcomes from the study includes the dramatic decrease in hospital costs (a 52% reduction!), while maintaining patient care quality (20% improvement), safety, and an overall positive patient experience.
• The ability to exchange secure text communication between clinical care teams and patients during the program impacted the day-to-day interactions by streamlining workflows, as care teams were located in and around the greater Boston area.
• With such positive outcomes resulting from the program, scaling the effort would require an increased use of telemedicine, and expanding the inclusion criteria to include a broader set of patients.
• The dramatic reduction in readmit rates (70%) resulted from getting to know patients in their home and setting them up for success post-discharge with more personalized and accurate communications.