This hospital-at-home programme was found to be more acceptable and as effective and safe as inpatient care. While caring for patients at home was significantly more costly than standard inpatient care, this was largely due to the hospital-at-home programme not operating at full capacity.

Objective To determine whether asthma specialist nurses, using a liaison model of care, reduce unscheduled care in a deprived multiethnic area. Design Cluster randomised controlled trial. Setting 44 general practices in two boroughs in east London. Participants 324 people aged 4-60 years admitted to or attending hospital or the general practitioner out of hours service with acute asthma; 164 (50%) were South Asian patients, 108 (34%) were white patients, and 52 (16%) were from other, largely African and Afro-Caribbean, ethnicities. Intervention Patient review in a nurse led clinic and liaison with general practitioners and practice nurses comprising educational outreach, promotion of guidelines for high risk asthma, and ongoing clinical support. Control practices received a visit promoting standard asthma guidelines; control patients were checked for inhaler technique. Main outcome measures Percentage of participants receiving unscheduled care for acute asthma over one year and time to first unscheduled attendance. Results Primary outcome data were available for 319 of 324 (98%) participants. Intervention delayed time to first attendance with acute asthma (hazard ratio 0.73, 95% confidence interval 0.54 to 1.00; median 194 days for intervention and 126 days for control) and reduced the percentage of participants attending with acute asthma (58% (101/174) v 68% (99/145); odds ratio 0.62, 0.38 to 1.01). In analyses of prespecified subgroups the difference in effect on ethnic groups was not significant, but results were consistent with greater benefit for white patients than for South Asian patients or those from other ethnic groups. Conclusion Asthma specialist nurses using a liaison model of care reduced unscheduled care for asthma in a deprived multiethnic health district. Ethnic groups may not benefit equally from specialist nurse intervention.

Aim Determine levels of depression, anxiety and stress symptoms and factors associated with psychological burden amongst critical care health care workers in the early stages of the coronavirus disease (2019) (COVID-19) pandemic. Methods Anonymous web-based survey distributed in April 2020. All health care workers employed in a critical care setting were eligible to participate. Invitations to the survey were distributed through Australian and New Zealand critical care societies and social media platforms. The primary outcome was the proportion of health care workers that reported moderate to extremely severe scores on the Depression Anxiety Stress Scale-21 (DASS-21) Results Of the 3770 complete responses, 3039 (80.6%) were from Australia. A total of 2871 respondents (76.2%) were female; median age was 41 years old. Nurses made up 2269 (60.2%) of respondents with most [2029 (53.8%)] working in Intensive Care Units.Overall, 813 (21.6%) respondents reported moderate to extremely severe depression, 1078 (28.6%) reported moderate to extremely severe anxiety and 1057 (28.0%) moderate to extremely severe stress scores. Mean ± standard deviation DASS-21 depression, anxiety and stress scores amongst woman vs men were: 8.0 ± 8.2 vs 7.1 ± 8.2 (p=0.003); 7.2 ± 7.5 vs 5.0 ± 6.7 (p<0.001); and 14.4 ± 9.6 vs 12.5 ± 9.4 (p<0.001) respectively.After adjusting for significant confounders, clinical concerns associated with higher DASS-21 scores included; not being clinically prepared (β 4.2, p<0.001), an inadequate workforce (β 2.4, p=0.001), having to triage patients due to lack of beds and or equipment (β 2.6, p=0.001), virus transmission to friends and family (β 2.1, p=0.009), contracting COVID-19 (β 2.8, p=0.011), being responsible for other staff (β 3.1, p<0.001), and being asked to work in an area that was not in the respondents expertise (β 5.7, p<0.001). Conclusion In this survey of critical care health care workers, between 22 and 29% of respondents reported moderate to extremely severe depression, anxiety and stress symptoms with females reporting higher scores compared to men. Although female gender appears to play a role, modifiable factors also contribute to psychological burden and should be studied further.

Background ‘Early discharge hospital at home’ is a service that provides active treatment by health care professionals in the patient’s home for a condition that otherwise would require acute hospital in-patient care. If hospital at home were not available then the patient would remain in an acute hospital ward. Objectives To determine, in the context of a systematic review and meta-analysis, the effectiveness and cost of managing patients with early discharge hospital at home compared with in-patient hospital care. Search methods We searched the Cochrane Effective Practice and Organisation of Care (EPOC) Group Register , MEDLINE (1950 to 2008), EMBASE (1980 to 2008), CINAHL (1982 to 2008) and EconLit through to January 2008. We checked the reference lists of articles identified for potentially relevant articles. Selection criteria Randomised controlled trials recruiting patients aged 18 years and over. Studies comparing early discharge hospital at home with acute hospital in-patient care. Evaluations of obstetric, paediatric and mental health hospital at home schemes are excluded from this review. Data collection and analysis Two authors independently extracted data and assessed study quality. Our statistical analyses were done on an intention-to-treat basis. We requested individual patient data (IPD) from trialists, and relied on published data when we did not receive trial data sets or the IPD did not include the relevant outcomes. For the IPD meta-analysis, where at least one event was reported in both study groups in a trial, Cox regression models were used to calculate the log hazard ratio and its standard error for mortality and readmission separately for each data set. The calculated log hazard ratios were combined using fixed-effect inverse variance meta-analysis. Main results Twenty-six trials were included in this review [n = 3967]; 21 were eligible for the IPD meta-analysis and 13 of the 21 trials contributed data [1899/2872; 66%]. For patients recovering from a stroke and elderly patients with a mix of conditions there was insufficient evidence of a difference in mortality between groups (adjusted HR 0.79, 95% CI 0.32 to 1.91; N = 494; and adjusted HR 1.06, 95% CI 0.69 to 1.61; N = 978). Readmission rates were significantly increased for elderly patients with a mix of conditions allocated to hospital at home (adjusted HR 1.57; 95% CI 1.10 to 2.24; N = 705). For patients recovering from a stroke and elderly patients with a mix of conditions respectively, significantly fewer people allocated to hospital at home were in residential care at follow-up (RR 0.63; 95% CI 0.40 to 0.98; N = 4 trials; RR 0.69, 95% CI 0.48 to 0.99; N =3 trials). Patients reported increased satisfaction with early discharge hospital at home. There was insufficient evidence of a difference for readmission between groups in trials recruiting patients recovering from surgery. Evidence on cost savings was mixed. Authors’ conclusions Despite increasing interest in the potential of early discharge hospital at home services...

Summary Climate change is a real and accelerating existential danger. Urgent action is required to halt its progression, and everyone can contribute. Pollution mitigation represents an important opportunity for much needed leadership from the health community, addressing a threat that will directly and seriously impact the health and well‐being of current and future generations. Inhalational anaesthetics are a significant contributor to healthcare‐related greenhouse gas emissions and minimising their climate impact represents a meaningful and achievable intervention. A challenge exists in translating well‐established knowledge about inhalational anaesthetic pollution into practical action. CODA is a medical education and health promotion charity that aims to deliver climate action‐oriented recommendations, supported by useful resources and success stories. The CODA‐hosted platform is designed to maximise engagement of the global healthcare community and draws upon diverse experiences to develop global solutions and accelerate action. The action guidance for addressing pollution from inhalational anaesthetics is the subject of this article. These are practical, evidence‐based actions that can be undertaken to reduce the impact of pollution from inhalational anaesthetics, without compromising patient care and include: removal of desflurane from drug formularies; decommissioning central nitrous oxide piping; avoidance of nitrous oxide use; minimising fresh gas flows during anaesthesia; and prioritising total intravenous anaesthesia and regional anaesthesia when clinically safe to do so. Guidance on how to educate, implement, measure and review progress on these mitigation actions is provided, along with means to share successes and contribute to the essential, global transition towards environmentally sustainable anaesthesia.