Despite there being a considerable number of meta-analyses and reviews synthesizing the nurse in-home visiting literature, there have been no reviews examining nurse in-home visiting for patients who are already disabled. This article presents a literature review and synthesis of 10 trials targeted on older adults with disability. The review is organized into structure and process components re...

To achieve sustainable change, quality improvement initiatives must become the new way of working rather than something added on to routine clinical care. However, most organizational change is not maintained. In this next article in this Moving Points in Nephrology feature on quality improvement, we provide health care professionals with strategies to sustain and support quality improvement. T...

OBJECTIVES To assess health outcomes of home follow-up visits after postpartum discharge and assess relationships between the number of home visits and selected outcomes among women who gave birth at two Queensland, Australia, regional hospitals. DESIGN A cross sectional study. Services provided during the home visits were responsive to a woman's need rather than having a structured protocol ...

BACKGROUND The AGnES-concept (AGnES: GP-supporting, community-based, e-health-assisted, systemic intervention) was developed to support general practitioners (GPs) in undersupplied regions. The project aims to delegate GP-home visits to qualified AGnES-practice assistants, to increase the number of patients for whom medical care can be provided.This paper focuses on the effect of delegating GP-...

OBJECTIVE To determine the incidence of pneumonia and severe pneumonia among children living at high altitudes in Pakistan. METHODS A longitudinal cohort study was conducted in which 99 female government health workers in Punial and Ishkoman valleys (Ghizer district, Northern Areas of Pakistan) enrolled children at home, conducted home visits every 2 weeks and actively referred sick children ...

BACKGROUND In 2000 a new GP contract was introduced in Poland. It allowed GPs to subcontract out of hours care to specialized deputizing services. One such service in Kraków provides care to 61 GP practices with a population of 420,000 inhabitants. The aim of this study is to analyze seasonal and geographical variation in out of hours care use and to find the most important factors influencing ...

OBJECTIVE To evaluate the effectiveness of a health visitor led intervention for failure to thrive in children under 2 years old. DESIGN Controlled trial, randomised by primary care practice. SETTING Newcastle upon Tyne health district. INTERVENTION Structured health visitor management, with dietetic, paediatric, and social work input as required. SUBJECTS 229 children (120 in intervent...

BACKGROUND A city-wide sanitation intervention was started in Salvador, Brazil, in 1997 to improve sewerage coverage from 26% of households to 80%. Our aim was to investigate the epidemiological effect of this city-wide sanitation programme on diarrhoea morbidity in children less than 3 years of age. METHODS The investigation was composed of two longitudinal studies done in 1997-98 before the...

BACKGROUND Students seeking degrees in healthcare in Ecuador participate in community improvement projects and provide free health services under the supervision of faculty health professionals. The aim of this study is to determine the impact of a community-based intervention delivered by nursing students on health-related quality of life (HRQoL) and perceived social support of a rural populat...

BACKGROUND Despite a variety of national efforts to improve transitions of care for patients at risk for rehospitalization, 30-day rehospitalization rates for patients with heart failure have remained largely unchanged. METHODS This is a retrospective review of 73 patients enrolled in our hospital-based, physican-directed Heart Failure Transitional Care Program (HFTCP). This study evaluated t...