Hospital Case Management – April 1, 2024

Wound Care Patients Receive Inadequate Care Coordination and Follow-Up

Inadequately preparing patients and caregivers for wound care at home can be costly. Pressure ulcers can cost tens of thousands of dollars a year, per patient. Each patient with this wound needs costly supplies and a special hospital bed. Nurses must turn them every two hours.

Ways to Improve Warm Handoffs and Transitions for Wound Care Patients

Warm handoffs and better patient/caregiver education on wound care can improve healing when patients are discharged. One way is to ask the patient for permission to take photos of the wound to show caregivers and community providers what it looked like at discharge.

Communication Tools Can Prevent Medication Errors After Discharge

A discharge medication communication bundle can help prevent liquid medication errors when caregivers treat children at home after hospital discharge, new research shows. The communication bundle resulted in fewer caregivers making medication errors when compared with a group receiving standard care.

Lipedema Affects More Patients than Case Managers Realize

Millions of women live with lipedema, a bilateral loose connective tissue disorder. Too few clinicians diagnose the disease — and too few women know they have it. As case managers work with patients who show signs of lipedema, there could be an opportunity to connect them to their physician for a lipedema evaluation.

Emotional Support Is Important to Caregivers of Children with Emotional-Behavioral Disorders

Parents raising children with developmental, emotional, or behavioral issues face substantial stress. Researchers studied whether adequate care coordination could improve their ability to cope with the strain, finding that it was very helpful for these families.

Motivational Interviewing for Better Patient Care

Motivational interviewing has been used for decades in substance abuse counseling and is now growing in use in healthcare settings to provide better care for patients and encourage health behavior change. Case managers can use motivational interviewing as a tool to provide patient-centered care that does not come across as judgmental, but rather supports and enhances a person’s motivation to change.

Using Genetic Testing to Improve Patient Health

To begin shifting from a reactive to a more proactive approach to healthcare, researchers and providers are taking notice of genetic testing and its benefits in making medical decisions.