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An unusual collaboration among three competing California hospitals is providing much-needed post-discharge care for homeless people. It is linking those individuals to ongoing medical benefits while freeing up hospital beds for more acute patients.
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Its a balancing act for most organizations weighing the need for error disclosure, which may lead to system changes that prevent harm to future patients, against the threat of lawsuits.
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One thing quality professionals can agree on is that in health care today, every dollar counts. Thats why pay-for-performance programs potentially can have a dramatic impact on your organization by getting the attention of hospital administrators and opening the floodgates to needed quality resources.
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Continuity of patient care has many facets, such as availability of information, availability or constancy of a clinician, a usual source of care, and follow-up appointment keeping. It is driven by the goal of providing seamless patient transitions from one setting to another.
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Daily multidisciplinary rounds, a full-time medical director who is part of the clinical resource management team, and a clinical resource manager who acts as an additional resource for the case managers on the floor were chosen carefully to promote better patient care when the case management model was developed at the new Memorial Hospital Miramar (FL).
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A quality improvement team that focused on ways clinicians could better manage patients pain developed a one-page clinical pathway that clearly shows what needs to be done.
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A clinical redesign project partnering social work and case management has resulted in a 15% drop in length of stay and a 66% reduction in denials during a period when the average number of cases increased by 24% at Childrens National Medical Center in Washington, DC.
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The most challenging part of redesigning a care management model is developing data and statistics to show the hospital administration that the extra expenditures will have a positive impact on the hospitals bottom line, notes Catherine Korn, RN, MS, CRNP, vice president of nursing at Southern Ocean County Hospital in Manahawkin, NJ.
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At its 15th Annual Conference in Orlando, FL, the Case Management Society of America (CMSA) presented its National Case Manager of the Year Award to Peter Moran, RN,C, BSN, MS, CCM, a staff nurse in the emergency department (ED) at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston.
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In todays litigious society, its more important than ever for case managers to take steps to protect themselves in case of a medical malpractice lawsuit, says Jacqueline Carolan, JD, an attorney with Fox Rothschild in Philadelphia.