AARC Clinical Practice Guideline: Adult Patients Transitioning From the Hospital on Oxygen

To assist clinicians transitioning patients from the hospital through the continuum of their ambulatory oxygen care needs, a multidisciplinary team of clinicians and patients used the Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development, and Evaluation methodology to make the following recommendations: (1) We recommend disease management for patients who are transitioning from the hospital to the home or domiciliary care on newly prescribed long-term oxygen therapy (LTOT) (strong recommendation, low certainty); (2) We recommend regular reassessments to determine the appropriateness of LTOT in adults who were recently discharged from the hospital setting (conditional recommendation, moderate certainty); (3) We suggest implementing a discharge coordination program to support the safe transition of adult patients requiring oxygen therapy (conditional recommendation, low certainty); (4) We suggest that assessments of the oxygen setting and device during rest and activity be conducted before the transition of an adult patient from the hospital to home or domiciliary care with an oxygen prescription (conditional recommendation, low certainty); (5) We suggest an evaluation of the domiciliary environment and activities of daily living, including an assessment of the risk of burns related to tobacco smoking or other ignition sources, for adult patients transitioning to home or domiciliary settings with a new oxygen prescription (conditional recommendation, low certainty); (6) We suggest offering peri-discharge education focused on the oxygen prescription to improve understanding and adherence to LTOT (conditional recommendation, low certainty).