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Background and aims Studies on multiprofessional preventive home visits to older people are needed. We describe here the baseline findings and feasibility of a randomized controlled study on preventive home visits delivered by a multiprofessional team. Materials and methods Participants ( n = 422) were home-dwelling people who were 75+ years old. They were recruited from the Hyvinkää municipal area. They were randomized into intervention and control groups. Participants in the intervention group received three home visits, delivered by a nurse, physiotherapist and social worker. Health-related quality of life (HRQoL), measured by 15D, was used as our primary outcome measurement. Feedback on the intervention was gathered from the participants. Results The mean age of our participants was 81 years. They scored 0.82 in the 15D HRQoL score, and 65% were female. The findings of both groups were similar in most background variables. The only differences between the groups were that lower proportions of participants in the intervention group had diabetes or used a walker. The professionals delivering the intervention reported that all intervention procedures had been delivered according to plan. Participants who responded to the feedback survey mostly reported having gained new information and were fairly content with the intervention. However, most participants felt the home visits had not improved their health or functioning. Conclusions We have successfully randomized participants into two study groups in this trial examining the effectiveness of preventive home visits. The intervention seems feasible and has mostly been well received. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction The aim of this study was to systematically review the evidence from randomized controlled trials (RCT) concerning effectiveness of preventive home visit (PHV) programs on older people's use and costs of health and social services. We also evaluated resultant costs-changes achieved with intervention in older people's functioning, quality-of-life (QOL) or mortality. Materials and methods A systematic review of published RCTs reporting use and/or costs on PHVs on multimorbid older people was performed. The characteristics and methodological quality of studies were assessed. Results Of the 3219 articles screened, 19 met the inclusion criteria. The methodological quality of the trials was principally moderate ( n = 5) or good ( n = 10). Of the studies, 12 evaluated the overall costs of health and social services. None of these studies was able to show significant differences in total costs between intervention and control groups. Six studies suggested that PHVs may decrease nursing home admissions and/or hospital days. Seven studies showed some favorable effect on physical functioning, QOL, or mortality, without increasing the total health care costs. Conclusions Of the high number of studies investigating efficacy of PHVs on older people, only a few studies explore economic effects. PHVs do not provide overall savings to health care costs, but some interventions might offer some cost-neutral positive effects on functioning, QOL and/or mortality. More studies are needed to clarify the effective aspects of the programs and cost-effectiveness of the PHVs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]