Growing Old at Home

Martin-Luther-Universität Halle-Wittenberg

Status: Completed

Conditions: Aging

Treatments: Behavioral: preventive home visit

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other

Identifiers

NCT00644826

PfVMS-T5

Details and patient eligibility

About

The purpose of this study is to determine whether preventive home visits for people aged 80 and over are effective in the prevention of nursing home admission in Germany.

Full description

Regarding demographic changes in Germany it can be assumed that the number of elderly and the resulting need for long term care is increasing in the near future. It is not only an individual's interest but also of public concern to avoid a nursing home admission. Current evidence indicates that preventive home visits can be an effective way to reduce the admission rate in this way making it possible for elderly people to stay longer at home than without home visits. As the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of preventive home visits strongly depends on existing services in the social and health system existing international results cannot be merely transferred to Germany. Therefore it is necessary to investigate the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of such an intervention by a randomized controlled trial in Germany.

Enrollment: 336 patients

Sex: All

Ages: 80+ years old

Volunteers: No Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

• older than 80
• fluent German speaker
• resident of Leipzig or Halle
• living at home (i.e. no nursing home resident)

Exclusion criteria

• cognitive impairment
• not able to give informed consent
• care level higher than 1 according to German long term care insurance

Trial design

Primary purpose: Supportive Care

Allocation: Randomized

Interventional model: Parallel Assignment

Masking: Single Blind

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336 participants in 2 patient groups

1

Experimental group

Treatment:

Behavioral: preventive home visit

2

No Intervention group