PALM BAY, Fla — The idea of home visits from a healthcare professional may sound like a throwback to a bygone period, but in Brevard County and increasingly in Florida, that concept has been taking hold and spreading.

For more than a year now, Health First offered its At Home Inpatient Services program, a system designed to offer what the hospital system describes as “the same level of care and treatment you’d get at the hospital, at no additional cost beyond your usual deductibles.”

Studies over the years have shown that those who are eligible and able to receive treatment at home are not only more satisfied with their care but also have a lower readmission rate to the hospital. Cost of care has also been proven to be lessened in this type of care setting.

According to The Commonwealth Fund, a health care focused foundation established in 1918, points to the Johns Hopkins model, which “found the total cost of at-home care was 32 percent less than traditional hospital care ($5,081 vs. $7,480), the mean length of stay for patients was shorter by one-third (3.2 days vs. 4.9 days), and the incidence of delirium (among other complications was dramatically lower (9% vs. 24%).”

Looking at its own data, Health First said the 30-day re-admission rate for at home patients was 8.5% compared to 13% who received in-hospital care.

Palm Bay resident Daryl Wattenbarger is one of over 500 patients who is a supporter of the relatively new system. He was in and out of hospitals in Central Florida between November 2021 and March 2022 with sepsis.

“The first roundabout, I was in the ICU, so it was bad and at one particular point, I was near death,” he said.

Wattenbarger said having the opportunity to get treated at his home and be with his wife was an important part of his road to recovery.

Dr. William Johnson, one of the physicians involved with Health First’s program, said there are also some unique benefits for the doctors and nurses involved as well.

“It gets us to target patients’ home lives because that’s such a big impact in patient health care, is what they’re actually doing in their homes,” Johnson said. “We get to see it first-hand if there’s like a box of medications the patient has just because they haven’t been really educated about some of their home health care, their home meds. We get to see exactly what they’re doing and what’s going on in regards to try to help them and educate them on why they’re taking these certain medications.”

Currently, Johnson said Health First has about six patients on average per day, but eventually, they would like to see that expand to somewhere around 20 to 30.

“We certainly have the room, we definitely have the infrastructure to make it happen,” Johnson said. “We’re just kind of trying to plug in the pieces to ensure that before we get ramped up into those volumes, there’s no lack of something that is going to be detrimental to the care of the patient.”

The at home system is done through a combination of medical personnel making daily visits to a patient’s home as well as a telemonitoring system, monitored by the hospital’s eICU team. It stands for electronic intensive care unit.

“We have a whole team of nurses that actually goes out to the home, administer medications, IV medications, anything that we can do here in the hospital, we can do at home,” Johnson said. “It’s a very, very inclusive program.”

Johnson said a nurse practitioner also does a thorough exam of the patient and then will sit down with him or another physician at the hospital to address the best course of care.

He also said they focus on safety, both for the patients they work with and the staff who do the field work.

“We want to make sure that no matter where we’re going, it’s going to be safe for everybody involved,” Johnson said. “So, it’s a very stringent screening process that we go through for everybody where we’re making sure we’re making the appropriate decision for the best interests of not only the patient, but for our staff members as well.”

Those interested in receiving at home care for themselves or a loved one can fill out the contact form on Health First’s website for more information.