Substudy 7 Fact Sheet

Overview of Home Care Clients (NA101-07)

Sponsor Organization:
Hollander Analytical Services Ltd.

Rationale/Goals:
This project is one of fifteen sub-studies of the National Evaluation of the Cost-Effectiveness of Home Care Project (NA101). Sub-study 7 provides a descriptive overview of the characteristics of home care clients in two jurisdictions, British Columbia and Saskatchewan. It also provides some basic data on resource utilization for British Columbia This study was prepared because there is no national database on home care in Canada. It was believed that some provincial data would be a useful contribution to information about home care.

Activities:
Home care data from British Columbia (33,053 clients) and Saskatchewan (12,623 clients) for the fiscal years 1997/98 and 1998/99 were examined, as was information on gender, age, length of stay, and marital status. A separate analysis on clients discharged from hospital into home care in British Columbia examined the role of home care in replacing hospital care.

Key Findings:
The project leaders identified the following outcomes:

• Overall there were approximately 1.3 females for every male in care across both jurisdictions. The relative proportion of females to males was higher for long-term clients than for short stay clients.
• The highest proportion of clients in both provinces was in the 75-to-84 age group.
• The analysis of service utilization in British Columbia found that both men and women who were in short-term care (up to 90 days) averaged some 27 days per care episode. Clients in care for 91 to 365 days averaged 259 days for men and 279 days for women.
• As periods of care lengthened, the proportion of home support services to professional services grew. Men and women in the short-term group received more professional services than home support services; those in longer-term care received up to nine times as much home support than professional services.
• Clients discharged from hospital had slightly shorter durations of home care services, but used more professional hours. The most common diagnoses were neoplasms (19.7%) and circulatory diseases (16.7 %)

Implications:
The project leader indicated that the findings are significant because, in his view:

• The relative proportion of short- and long-term care clients in various jurisdictions will impact the volume and type of resources required.
• The growing emphasis in some jurisdictions on home care as hospital substitution may result in human resource and budget issues as cheaper home support services are replaced with more costly professional services.
  

Evaluation Methodology:
As this project was analytic/evaluative in nature, please see the "Activities" section.

HTF Contribution to the Project:
$1,505,000 (divided among the 15 sub-studies)

Language of Report:
English

• Full report