From the ER to your house: Why hospitals are treating patients at home

The hospital-at-home movement has proliferated during the past decade , reshaping how acute care is delivered.

Health systems shifting patients to their homes to be monitored virtually and with daily visits.

The federal government in 2020 eased regulations on home hospital programs to keep people out of facilities overwhelmed by covid cases.

Health-care leaders are lobbying Congress for a five-year extension, a decision that could cement rise of home hospital services.

National Nurses United , the country’s largest registered nurses union, asserts that patients are better served in hospitals where registered nurses and other medical professionals are always down the hallway.

Advocates of in-hospital nursing point to studies finding that medical errors are less common when nurses regularly monitor patients.

Nurses fear that the movement toward home care will accelerate hospital closures and the loss of acute-care beds.

The program is not a great fit for people who need intensive treatment by specialists or extensive testing to diagnose their condition.

Doctoroff has noticed that patients with dementia and other cognitive dysfunction find more solace in a familiar setting than a frenetic, destabilizing hospital.

Some older patients warmly recall the days of doctors making house visits.