Effects of Home-Based Physical Exercise on Days at Home, Health Care Utilization, and Functional Independence Among Patients With Hip Fractures: A Randomized Controlled Trial.

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the effects of a physical exercise program on days lived at home, the use and costs of health care and social services, mortality, and functional independence among patients with hip fractures. DESIGN: Randomized controlled trial with a parallel 2-group design consisting of a 12-month intervention and 12-month registry follow-up. SETTING: Home-based intervention. PARTICIPANTS: Patients aged ≥60 years (N=121) with operated hip fracture and who were living at home were randomized into physical exercise (n=61) and usual care (n=60) groups. INTERVENTIONS: Supervised physical exercise twice a week. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: The primary outcome was the number of days lived at home over 24 months. Secondary outcomes were the use and costs of health care and social services, mortality over 24 months, and Functional Independence Measure (FIM) over 12 months. RESULTS: Over 24 months, there was no significant difference between the groups in terms of days lived at home (incidence rate ratio, 1.01; 95% confidence interval [CI], 0.90-1.14) or mortality (hazard ratio, 1.01; 95% CI, 0.42-2.43). The mean total costs of health care and social services did not differ between the groups. The costs per person-year were 1.26-fold (95% CI, 0.87-1.86) greater in the physical exercise group than in the usual care group over 12 months and 1.08-fold (95% CI, 0.77-1.70) over 24 months. The mean difference between the change in FIM of the groups over 12 months was 4.5 points (95% CI, 0.5-8.5; P=.029) in favor of the physical exercise group. CONCLUSIONS: Long-term home-based physical exercise had no effect on the number of days lived at home over 24 months among patients with hip fractures. The intervention was cost neutral over these 24 months. The FIM scores improved in both groups over 12 months, but the improvement was significantly greater in the physical exercise group than in the usual care group.