Nicholson 2001.
| Study characteristics | ||
| Methods | Parallel randomised trial Study conducted between October 1999 and October 2000. |
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| Participants | Setting: Australia Patients with COPD Inclusion criteria: age > 45 years, COPD, current or ex‐smoker, FEV1 < 60% predicted, admission requested by GP or OPD clinic staff or ED staff, telephone at home Number recruited: hospital at home: 13; hospital: 12 |
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| Interventions | Hospital at home (discharge from emergency department) Patients retained in patient status and received clinical supervision from hospital specialist, and hospital had legal and financial responsibility; also received care from GP, community nursing, and domiciliary care. Hospital medical staff provided 24‐hour telephone support. |
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| Outcomes | Cost to the health service | |
| Notes | Follow‐up: duration of care in hospital at home or inpatient care Funding: the Commonwealth Department of Health and Aged Care, National Demonstration Hospitals Program Phase 3 Conflicts of interest: not reported Ethical approval: not reported |
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| Risk of bias | ||
| Bias | Authors' judgement | Support for judgement |
| Random sequence generation (selection bias) | Unclear risk | Random sequence generation not described |
| Allocation concealment (selection bias) | Unclear risk | Allocation concealment not described |
| Baseline outcome measurements (selection bias) | Unclear risk | Baseline outcome measurements not reported |
| Baseline characteristics (selection bias) | Unclear risk | Baseline characteristics of the study and control groups not reported |
| Blinding of participants and personnel (performance bias) All outcomes | Unclear risk | Blinding of participants and personnel not possible |
| Blinding of outcome assessment (detection bias) Subjective outcomes | Unclear risk | None reported |
| Blinding of outcome assessment (detection bias) Objective outcomes | Low risk | Low risk for resource use and cost |
| Incomplete outcome data (attrition bias) All outcomes | Unclear risk | Insufficient information to allocate low or high risk |
| Selective reporting (reporting bias) | Unclear risk | Insufficient information to allocate low or high risk |