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Orientation should be geared to the experiential level of the new staff. The novice case manager will require a different orientation than the experienced case manager. You will need to determine this based on an assessment of the new staff member.
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Healthcare reform mandates, new reimbursement requirements from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), and pressure from payers to keep patients out of the hospital and emergency department all mean that hospitals need to do a better job of transitioning patients to another level of care.
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After Summa Health System and Akron, OH, area nursing facilities formed the Care Coordination Network to improve communication throughout the continuum of care, lengths of stay and readmissions for patients transferred to facilities in the network dropped.
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A pilot project providing coaching and follow up for heart failure (HF) patients who are readmitted frequently resulted in a 50% drop in the readmission rate at Indiana University (IU) Health Ball Memorial Hospital in Muncie, IN.
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The recruitment and retention of good case managers has never been more important than it is today. In the early years of hospital case management, many case managers transitioned into the role from utilization review or discharge planning positions.
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Where will we find the new case managers and what will the new candidate look like? They might not be the seasoned clinician as you would hope for. As we need more and more case managers and social workers, some of us might need to look even more broadly for our candidates.
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At Pennsylvania State University (Penn State) Milton S. Hershey Medical Center in Hershey, PA, a long-term acute care liaison evaluates patients with complex needs for potential placement in a long-term acute care hospital (LTACH), coordinates a comprehensive plan for transition with the treatment team, and works with the accepting facility and the patients' insurers to ensure a smooth transition.
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ACEI/ARB therapy for AS; safety alert issued for dronedarone; statins and cancer risk; nesiritide and heart failure; and FDA actions.
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In a multicenter randomized (not blinded) Phase 3 study of erlotinib vs chemotherapy for EGFR-mutation positive non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), progression-free survival was both significantly greater and toxicity less for patients treated with erlotinib. The findings suggest that erlotinib should be considered first-line therapy for patients with advanced EGFR mutation-positive NSCLC.
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In a case-control study, patients with prostate cancer and matched controls were asked to recall whether they experienced male-pattern baldness by 20, 30, or 40 years of age. Prostate cancer patients were twice as likely to have alopecia at age 20 than controls. Early-age alopecia was not associated with early diagnosis of prostate cancer or with markers of disease aggressiveness. Thus, men with male-pattern baldness at age 20 may be at higher risk for the development of prostate cancer and perhaps more aggressive screening or other disease preventing interventions might prove beneficial for this population.
