Table 2.
Characteristics and scope of the included systematic reviews
| Author, year, country | Aima | Search strategy | No. of studies and designa | No. of participantsa | AMSTAR score out of 11 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Home with support versus independent living at home (n = 11) | |||||
| van Haastregt, 2000, [23] the Netherlands |
Evaluate preventive home visits to elderly people living in the community. | Medline, Embase, and the Cochrane Controlled Trials Register |
N = 15 All RCT |
N = 8789 | 6 |
| Markle-Reid, 2006, [21] Canada |
Evaluate home-based-nursing health promotion and preventive care. | Medline, CINAHL, Cochrane Controlled Trials Register, Ageline, Health Star, PsychInfo, Sociological Abstracts, Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, and the Social Science Citation Index for reports of primary research | N = 11 (of the 12 included in review) All RCTs | N = 16124 | 6 |
| Huss, 2008, [22] Switzerland |
Evaluate preventative home visit programs aimed at maintaining health and autonomy of older adults. | MEDLINE, EMBASE, Cochrane CENTRAL database, and the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials |
N = 21 All RCTs |
N = 14602 | 7 |
| Beswick, 2010, [20] UK |
Evaluate complex interventions aimed at promoting independence in older people. | Cochrane CENTRAL, MEDLINE, EMBASE, CINAHL, PsycINFO, and ISI Science and Social Science Citation Index | N = 110 All RCTs | N = 108838 | 4 |
| Mehta, 2011, [18] Canada |
Evaluate home physiotherapy to no physiotherapy or outpatient physiotherapy following hip fracture surgery. | MED LINE, CINAHL, EMBASE, and the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials | N = 5 All RCTs | N = 329 | 6 |
| Turner, 2011, [28] UK |
Evaluate home modifications on the reduction of injuries. | ASSIA, British Nursing Index, CINAHL, Cochrane Library, EMBASE, ICONDA, MEDLINE, MEDLINE In-Process, Open SIGLE, Planex, RIBA-British Architectural Library Catalogue, SafetyLit, Urbadisc, Web of Science, Science Citation Index and Social Sciences Citation, Index, Conference Proceedings Citation Index | N = 20 (in the elder population) Cochrane review All RCTs | N = 9389 | 10 |
| Fens, 2013, [19], the Netherlands | Evaluate multidisciplinary care delivered to stroke patients living in the community after discharge from hospital or inpatient rehabilitation. | PubMed, EMBASE, CINAHl and the Cochrane Library | N = 4 (of 14 included) All RCTs | N = 774 | 5 |
| You, 2013 [25] Australia |
Evaluate case management in community aged care (CMCAC) interventions on service use and costs. | Web of Science, Scopus, Medline, CINAHL (EBSCO) and PsycINFO (CSA). Google Scholar identified studies unavailable in these databases | N = 21 RCT, cluster RCT (n = 16), comparative observational (n = 5) | N = 44012 | 5 |
| Bryant-Lukosius, 2015, [24] Canada | Evaluate clinical and cost effectiveness of clinical nurse specialists providing transitional care. | CINAHL, EMBASE, Global Health, HealthStar, Medline, Allied and Complementary Medicine Database (AMED), Cochrane Library Database of Systematic Reviews and Controlled Trials Register, Database of Abstracts of Reviews of Effects, Health Economics Evaluation Database, and Web of Science | N = 5 (of 13 included) All RCTs | N = 964 | 8 |
| Reilly, 2015 [26] UK |
Evaluate case management approaches to home support for people with dementia. | ALOIS, the Specialised Register of the Cochrane Dementia and Cognitive Improvement Group, The Cochrane Library, MEDLINE, EMBASE, PsycINFO, CINAHL, LILACS, Web of Science, Campbell Collaboration/SORO database and the Specialised Register of the Cochrane Effective Practice and Organisation of Care Group | N = 13 All RCTs | N = 9615 | 10 |
| Liu, 2016, [27] Canada |
Evaluate effectiveness of smart homes and home health-monitoring technologies for older adults with complex needs. | Scopus, PubMed, Cinahl, IEEE Explore, ISI Web of Sciences, and ACM Digital Library | N = 48 RCTs and other designs (specifics NR) | N = 11375 | 8 |
| Home care versus institutional care (n = 3) | |||||
| Mottram, 2002, [7] UK |
Compare outcomes of long term home care versus institutional care for functionally dependent older people. | Cochrane Effective Practice and Organization of Care Group (EPOC), the Cochrane Controlled Trials Register, MEDLINE, EMBASE, Best Evidence, Ageline, Cinahl, EconLit, PsycInfo, NTIS, Scisearch, Sigle. | N = 1 Cochrane Review RCT | N = 112 | 9 |
| Gomes, 2013, [30] UK |
Evaluate home palliative care services, odds of dying at home, and the clinical effectiveness of home palliative care services. | Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials, EMBASE, MEDLINE, Cochrane Pain, Palliative and Supportive Care Trials Register, Cochrane Effective Practice and Organization of Care Trials Register, CINAHL, EURONHEED, PsycINFO, Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, Database of Abstracts of Reviews of Effectiveness, Health Technology Assessment Database, NHS Economic Evaluation Database | N = 23 RCT (n = 16) Controlled trial, controlled before and after, interrupted time series with nested controlled before and after (n = 7) |
N = 41603 n = 37561 (elderly) n = 4042 (caregivers) |
10 |
| Wysocki, 2015, [29] USA |
Evaluate outcomes of older adults receiving home and community-based support versus those living in nursing homes. | Medline (via Ovid), AgeLine | N = 14 Longitudinal RCTs and quasi-experimental observational designs (specifics NR) | NR | 6 |
| Rehabilitation at home versus conventional rehabilitation care (n = 7) | |||||
| Britton, 2000, [32] Sweden |
Evaluate post-stroke home rehabilitation compared to conventional alternatives. | MEDLINE, Cochrane Library, Cinahl, Econlit, ArbSpriline, ABI Inform, and Sociological Abstracts. | N = 7 RCT (n = 6), controlled trial (n = 1) | N = 1487 | 6 |
| Toussant, 2005, [34] United States |
Evaluate physical therapy in the management of hip fractures that were surgically treated. | PubMed, ProQuest, EBSCO. | N = 3 (of 15 included) RCT, blocked RCT equivalence trial | N = 451 | 4 |
| Hillier, 2010, [33] Australia |
Evaluate stroke rehabilitation delivered in the home compared to an outpatient clinic or day hospital setting. | Cochrane library, Ovid (Medline, AMED, Embase, Ageline), Ebsco (Cinahl) and PEDro. | N = 6 (of 15 publications) All RCTs | N = 1170 | 6 |
| Mehta, 2011, [18] | As above | As above | As above | As above | As above |
| Allen, 2012, [35] Canada |
Evaluate rehabilitation practices for patients with dementia who have had a hip fracture | Medline, CINAHL, Cochrane, Embase, PEDro, PsychINFO, Web of Science, and Scopus. | N = 1 (of 13 included) Prospective longitudinal cohort | N = 96 | 4 |
| Fens, [19] | As above | As above | N = 5 (of 14 included in review) All RCTs | N = 1029 | As above |
| Brown, 2015, [31] UK |
Evaluate multidisciplinary rehabilitation services in medical day hospitals on older patients’ health outcomes. | Cochrane Effective Practice and Organisation of Care Group Register of Studies, CENTRAL, MEDLINE via Ovid, EMBASE via Ovid and CINAHL via EbscoHost | N = 7 (of 16) All RCTs | N = 901 | 10 |
AMSTAR = Assessing the Methodological Quality of Systematic Reviews, RCT Randomized control trial, NR not reported
a Aims reported here are those relevant to this overview. When appropriate, only the subset of studies specific to the eligibility of this overview are reported