Hospital-to-Home Neurological Transition Care: A Scoping Review Across Selected Chronic Neurological Disorders.

BACKGROUND

Returning home after neurological hospitalization, rehabilitation, or specialist care transfers responsibility to patients, caregivers, and community services. We mapped mechanisms and gaps across dementia/Alzheimer's disease and related dementias (ADRD), Parkinson's disease (PD), multiple sclerosis (MS), and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS).

METHODS

Following JBI guidance and PRISMA-ScR, eligibility was derived using population-concept-context. We included empirical reports involving adults with a target condition, a post-discharge, return-home, rehabilitation, telehealth, caregiver, treatment, respiratory, or palliative continuity component, and post-transition patient, caregiver, service, safety, rehabilitation, equity, or implementation outcomes. Five databases were searched through to 11 May 2026. Two reviewers independently screened records; charting and classification were verified by R.S.C., A.C., and A.Q.

RESULTS

Of 24,417 records, 69 reports were included: Dementia/ADRD, 28; PD, 10; MS, 9; and ALS, 22. Eighteen were core transition reports (26.1%), 14 return-home/community re-entry reports (20.3%), 16 adjacent continuity reports (23.2%), and 21 companion/secondary reports (30.4%). Dementia/ADRD provided discharge-anchored evidence; PD and MS mapped functional carry-over; ALS mapped adjacent respiratory, telehealth, and palliative continuity.

CONCLUSIONS

The main contribution is an operational cross-disease framework separating direct discharge, return-home, adjacent-continuity, and companion evidence while linking mechanisms to disease-specific pathways. This framework maps disease-specific functions, not comparative effectiveness. The proposed frameworks are author-derived and hypothesis-generating. Future studies should use explicit anchors, standardized outcomes, longer follow-up, and equity-sensitive implementation measures addressing caregiver workload, digital access, feasibility, and sustainability. They inform testable, context-sensitive intervention designs for future neurological transition-care research and practice.