One phone call cuts risk of elderly going to back to hospital by 40pc

SIMPLE phone checks on the elderly after they leave hospital can cut the number of emergency readmissions by more than 40 per cent, research has found.

Experts said the measure could stop thousands of pensioners from worsening health – and save the NHS millions.

Research by Aston University shows over-65s given a phone call by nurses within a day of leaving hospital were 41 per cent less likely to be readmitted in the next month.

Doctors said the checks meant they could ensure patients knew which medication to take, could check for any signs of confusion, and arrange home visits if required. Currently, around one in seven older patients end up back in A&E within a month of discharge.

NHS figures show that there were around 865,000 emergency readmissions to English hospitals in 2017-18, costing the NHS at least £2.4billion.

Dr James Brown, lead researcher, said: “Our work shows that a simple service, whereby community nurses attempt to contact older adult patients after they are discharged from hospital, leads to a significant reduction in the number of patients readmitted within a month. It may seem hard to believe that something as simple as a phone call can have such a major impact, but our evidence suggests that this is so.”

In the study, published in Future Healthcare Journal, researchers tracked more than 750 pensioners. Those with no follow-up had a 15.7 per cent chance of being rushed back to A&E. But those contacted by nurses saw their risk fall to 9.2 per cent – a 41 per cent drop.

Dr Martha Pinkney, elderly care consultant at Solihull Hospital, part of University Hospitals Birmingham NHS Foundation Trust, said: “We have shown that a simple and inexpensive intervention may be highly effective at reducing readmission rates … This finding warrants further investigation in a prospective controlled setting to quantify these potential significant benefits for both patients and the health service.”