Nurse home visit programs for the elderly.

Abstract

Nurses are the largest professional provider of health care services in the home setting. However, nurse home visit programs are diverse. The purpose of this review was to examine the many factors that influence the effectiveness of nurse home visit programs for older adults. Donebedian's Quality Assessment Model was used to organize the review using the components of structure, process, and outcome. A total of 60 home visit studies were identified that met the following criteria: (1) nurses were a major or only provider of the intervention, (2) the intervention was delivered by home visits, and (3) the study included a comparison group. This review demonstrates the complexity of variables that determine the effectiveness of home visit interventions. Many studies demonstrated lower overall health care costs for the intervention group with either improved or at least no change in clinical outcomes.