How Can Hospitals Improve the Discharge Process?
Aug 23 2012 in Denise's Blog, Your Caregiving Journey by Denise
Last night, our Hot Topic segment aired on Your Caregiving Journey. Our panel of family caregivers (Jane, Bette, Richard and ejourneys) answered this question: How can hospitals improve their discharge process? (You can listen to our show via the player below.)
The panel shared great ideas, including having the hospital staff email the discharge papers to the family caregiver, have one staff member (rather than several) handle the entire discharge process, and have the hospital staff schedule the follow-up doctor’s appointment for the caree.
ejourneys also suggested that you ask for copies of your caree’s flow sheets. You may incur additional costs for the copies but you’ll have more information about the care given during the hospitalization.
What suggestions would you add? Please share in our comments section, below.
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G-J said on August 23, 2012
Good morning! I haven’t yet listened to the show, but I had to respond to this. Discharge people at reasonable times of day. When my parents were both alive and living in AZ, the hospital would sometimes call my Mom at 9:00 or 10:00PM and say my Dad was being discharged and she needed to pick him up! She was 82 years old and didn’t like driving at night. Plus she couldn’t run to the pharmacy and pick up whatever was needed at that hour. We told her to stop answering the phone after 5:00PM and then they wouldn’t be able to reach her to pick up my Dad.
So, my suggestion for how they can improve the discharge process is to only discharge patients at reasonable times of day, or give the family the option of whether or not they would be willing to pick up the person at any time.
Trish said on August 23, 2012
Another great show with concrete suggestions on how to improve the process. Great addition from G-J, too! Thanks, Denise.