Association between post-hospital clinic and telephone follow-up provider visits with 30-day readmission risk in an integrated health system.

BACKGROUND: Follow-up visits with clinic providers after hospital discharge may not be feasible for some patients due to functional limitations, transportation challenges, need for physical distancing, or fear of exposure especially during the current COVID-19 pandemic. METHODS: The aim of the study was to determine the effects of post-hospital clinic (POSH) and telephone (TPOSH) follow-up provider visits versus no visit on 30-day readmission. We used a retrospective cohort design based on data from 1/1/2017 to 12/31/2019 on adult patients (n = 213,513) discharged home from 15 Kaiser Permanente Southern California hospitals. Completion of POSH or TPOSH provider visits within 7 days of discharge was the exposure and all-cause 30-day inpatient and observation stay readmission was the primary outcome. We used matching weights to balance the groups and Fine-Gray subdistribution hazard model to assess for readmission risk. RESULTS: Unweighted all-cause 30-day readmission rate was highest for patients who completed a TPOSH (17.3%) followed by no visit (14.2%), non-POSH (evaluation and management visits that were not focused on the hospitalization: 13.6%) and POSH (12.6%) visits. The matching weighted models showed that the effects of POSH and TPOSH visits varied across patient subgroups. For high risk (LACE 11+) medicine patients, both POSH (HR: 0.77, 95% CI: 0.71, 0.85, P < .001) and TPOSH (HR: 0.91, 95% CI: 0.83, 0.99, P = .03) were associated with 23 and 9% lower risk of 30-day readmission, respectively, compared to no visit. For medium to low risk medicine patients (LACE< 11) and all surgical patients regardless of LACE score or age, there were no significant associations for either visit type with risk of 30-day readmission. CONCLUSIONS: Post-hospital telephone follow-up provider visits had only modest effects on 30-day readmission in high-risk medicine patients compared to clinic visits. It remains to be determined if greater use and comfort with virtual visits by providers and patients as a result of the pandemic might improve the effectiveness of these encounters.

Telehealth transitional care and 30-day readmission during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Transitional care management (TCM) services after hospital discharge are critical for continuity of care, and the COVID-19 pandemic accelerated the shift to telehealth modes of delivery. This study examined the shift from face-to-face to telehealth care around the start of the pandemic (April-July 2020) compared with the same months in 2019 and 2021 and the corresponding 30-day readmission rates. We compared the rates of face-to-face and telehealth TCM as well as face-to-face and telehealth non-TCM services and observed a dramatic shift to telehealth in 2020 with a slight drop-off in 2021. For TCM services specifically, face-to-face visits made up nearly 90% of visits in 2019, whereas telehealth made up the vast majority in 2020 and 2021 at 97.5% and 84.9%, respectively. Over the same time periods, 30-day readmission rates remained steady at 10% along with no changes in 30-day mortality. Among those who completed TCM visits, 30-day readmission rates remained between 8% and 9% and 30-day mortality remained below 1%. These data indicate that this dramatic systemwide shift from face-to-face to telehealth TCM was not accompanied by concurrent changes in either 30-day readmission or mortality rates. Although the findings may be subject to ecologic bias, the data at hand did not allow for reliable estimation of differences in effects of patient-level service delivery type on readmission risk or mortality due to the extremely low volume of face-to-face visits during the pandemic periods. Future research would be needed to conduct such comparisons.

Association of a Medicare Advantage Posthospitalization Home Meal Delivery Benefit With Rehospitalization and Death.

Importance: The 2018 Chronic Care Act allowed Medicare Advantage plans to have greater flexibility in offering supplemental benefits, such as meals and services, to address unmet needs of beneficiaries with certain chronic conditions. Based on earlier studies of community-based nutritional support, such programs may result in reduced use. Objective: To evaluate the association of a 4-week posthospitalization home-delivered meals benefit with 30-day all-cause rehospitalization and mortality in patients admitted for heart failure (HF) and other acute medical conditions (non-HF). Design, Setting, and Participants: In this cohort study, patients who received meals (the meals group) were compared with 2 controls: (1) no meals in the 2019 historical cohort who would have been eligible for the benefit (the no meals-2019 group) and (2) no meals in the 2021 and 2022 concurrent cohort who were referred but did not receive the meals due to unsuccessful contacts and active declines (the no meals-2021/2022 group). This study took place in a large integrated health care system in southern California among Medicare Advantage members with a hospitalization for HF or other acute medical conditions at 15 Kaiser Permanente hospitals discharged to home. Exposure: The exposure was receipt of at least 1 and up to 4 shipments of home-delivered meals (total of 56 to 84 meals) after hospital discharge. Main Outcomes and Measures: The main outcomes were 30-day all-cause composite rehospitalization and death. Results: A total of 4032 adults with admission to the hospital for HF (mean [SD] age, 79 [9] years; 1951 [48%] White; 2001 [50%] female) and 7944 with non-HF admissions (mean [SD] age, 78 [8] years; 3890 [49%] White; 4149 [52%] female) were included in the analyses. Unadjusted rates of 30-day death and rehospitalization for the meals, no meals-2019, and no meals-2021/2022 cohorts were as follows: HF: 23.3%, 30.1%, and 38.5%; non-HF: 16.5%, 22.4%, and 32.9%, respectively. For HF, exposure to meals was significantly associated with lower odds of 30-day death and rehospitalization compared with the no meals-2021/2022 cohort (OR, 0.55; 95% CI, 0.43-0.71; P < .001) but was not significant compared with the no meals-2019 cohort (OR, 0.86; 95% CI, 0.72-1.04; P = .12). For non-HF, exposure to meals was associated with significantly lower odds of 30-day death and rehospitalization when compared with the no meals-2019 (OR, 0.64; 95% CI, 0.52-0.79; P < .001) and the no meals-2021/2022 (OR, 0.48; 95% CI, 0.37-0.62; P < .001) cohorts. Conclusions and Relevance: In this cohort study, exposure to posthospitalization home-delivered meals was associated with lower 30-day rehospitalization and mortality; randomized clinical trials are needed to confirm these findings.

Impact of Inpatient Palliative Care on Quality of End-of-Life Care and Downstream Acute and Postacute Care Utilization.

BACKGROUND: Additional evidence is needed regarding the impact of inpatient palliative care (IPC) on the quality of end-of-life care and downstream utilization. AIM: Examine the effects of IPC on quality of end-of-life care and acute and postacute care use in a large integrated system. DESIGN: Retrospective cohort design. SETTING/PARTICIPANTS: Adult decedents from January 1, 2012, to December 31, 2014, who had at least one hospitalization at 11 Kaiser Permanente Southern California medical centers in the 12 months before death and not hospitalized for a trauma-related condition or receiving home-based PC or hospice were included in the cohort. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Inverse probability of treatment weighting of propensity scores was used to compare outcomes between patients exposed to IPC (n = 3742) and controls (n = 12,755) who never received IPC before death. RESULTS: Patients who received IPC were more likely to enroll in home-based PC or hospice (69% vs. 43%) and were less likely to die in a hospital (15% vs. 29%) or intensive care (2% vs. 9%) compared with controls (all, p < 0.001). IPC exposure was associated with higher risk for rehospitalization (HR: 1.18, 95% CI 1.11-1.25) and more frequent emergency department visits (RR: 1.16, 95% CI 1.07-1.26) with no increase in postacute care use compared with controls. Stratified analyses showed that IPC effects on acute care utilization were dependent on code status. CONCLUSION: IPC exposure was associated with higher enrollment in home-based PC/hospice and more deaths at home. The increased acute care utilization by the IPC group may reflect persistent confounding by indication.