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Researchers say there need to be more clinical trials examining the safety and effectiveness of pain medications used with children, which are too often administered based on information from adult trials.
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But this is how we've always done it." Whenever you hear this phrase, take a close look at the process to which it refers. The staff at Visiting Nurse Association of Greater Philadelphia did and the close look resulted in a process change that resulted in a $400,000 savings over an 8-month period.
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A new study from the Dartmouth Atlas Project seems to indicate the "report card" for Medicare patients at the end of their lives is a mixed bag of pluses and minuses.
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Medicare spending on hospice care for nursing facility residents has grown nearly 70% since 2005. Additionally, hundreds of hospices had a high percentage of their patients residing in nursing facilities, and most of these hospices were for-profit.
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This is the second of a two-part series that looks at communicating with patients who have difficulty communicating. Last month, we looked at innovative and proven strategies to communicate with patients who have dementia. This month, tips and strategies for communicating with pediatric patients, and their families, are offered.
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Hospices serving people with Medicare will see a 2.5% increase in their Medicare payments for fiscal year (FY) 2012, according to a final regulation released July 29, 2011, by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS). Hospices also are called upon to begin reporting on the quality of care received by Medicare patients as a result of this final regulation.
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What do robots and iPads have in common? Both are tools used successfully by hospices to improve communications with patients who have dementia.
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Paid caregivers make it possible for seniors to remain living in their homes. The problem, according to a new Northwestern Medicine study, is that more than one-third of caregivers had difficulty reading and understanding health-related information and directions. Sixty percent made errors when sorting medications into pillboxes.
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A study published recently in Health Affairs shows that hospitalization costs for patients with certain terminal or serious chronic illnesses are significantly lower when palliative care is provided. In fact, the study of four hospitals in New York State showed an average cost of admission that was $6,900 lower for these patients.
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Cost and time constraints limit the amount of advanced care planning that a primary care physician can provide to patients, but when patients received educational information prior to meeting with their doctors, the number of advanced medical directives completed increases by more than 17%.
