Working with NHS boards and health and social care partnerships to develop Hospital at Home services
Hospital at Home is a short-term, targeted intervention that provides a level of acute hospital care in an individual’s own home that is equivalent to that provided within a hospital. Healthcare Improvement Scotland has established a programme to support the implementation of Hospital at Home, including work with a mixture of NHS boards and health and social care partnerships.
A Hospital at Home service must include four key elements:
- a hospital specialist acts as senior decision maker and responsible medical officer
- care delivered by a multidisciplinary teams
- urgent access to diagnostics, and
- management of more severe conditions.
To date the programme has delivered:
- a reduction in the average length of stay by 27% between 2021 and 2022
- an increase in the number of patients managed by 68% between 2021 and 2022, and
- an increase in the number of HSCPs with a Hospital at Home service by 258% between April 2020 and December 2022.
Support for Hospital at Home services
We support NHS boards and health and social care partnerships to develop and optimise Hospital at Home services by:
- providing quality improvement expertise to improve how services are delivered
- delivering networking and learning sessions to enable services to share experience, and
- providing resources to enable HSCPs and NHS boards to design and implement services, including a comprehensive toolkit, case studies.
Get involved
If you have an interest in Hospital at Home or would like to explore options for developing a Hospital at Home service please get in touch:
- join our mailing network to receive invites to networking sessions by emailing your details to his.communitycare@nhs.scot
- following us on Twitter: @ihubscot, or
- visit our Hospital at Home toolkit.
Get in touch
If you would like to learn more about the Hospital at Home programme and the progress being made to develop the model throughout Scotland please get in touch at his.communitycare@nhs.scot.
Please note that Healthcare Improvement Scotland cannot provide information or support for individuals in Hospital at Home care. If you, a relative or someone you care for have questions about your eligibility for Hospital at Home or specific Hospital at Home queries regarding your care, please contact your GP.