Home Health Aides Caring for Adults With Heart Failure

Can an education and communication-based intervention improve knowledge and caregiving self-efficacy among home health aides and attendants (HHAs) caring for adults with heart failure (HF)?In this pilot randomized clinical trial including 102 agency-employed HHAs randomized to training alone or in addition to an application that allowed HHAs to exchange text messages with nurse supervisors, training improved HHAs’ HF knowledge and HF caregiving self-efficacy. The addition of the application did not improve these primary outcomes, but it significantly reduced HHAs’ self-reported preventable 911 calls, a secondary outcome.These results support a future RCT that will test the effectiveness of the intervention on outcomes for both HHAs and their patients with HF.

Corresponding Author: Madeline R. Sterling, MD, MPH, MS, Department of Medicine, Weill Cornell Medicine, 420 E 70th St, LH-357, New York, NY 10065 (mrs9012@med.cornell.edu).

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