Patients with shortness of breath are "one of the highest priority patients" for ED nurses because of their tendency to rapidly deteriorate, says Alexandra Penzias, RN, MEd, MSN, CEN, an ED educator at Tufts Medical Center in Boston, MA. "We perform a complete set of vital signs, oxygen saturation, and peak flow measurements at triage," she says.
ED patients often don't understand important information in their discharge instructions, according to a new study, which can result in bad outcomes and needless repeat visits.
Medicare spends about $17 billion a year on hospital readmissions that could have been prevented, experts say.
Case managers at Children's Hospital Boston wrote a successful set of guidelines describing roles and responsibilities in the hospital's collaboration with home care liaisons during the discharge process.
The hospital discharge process for cardiopulmonary patients could offer patients' families and friends a video self-instruction course on cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) that improves discharge education and has the potential to save lives.
A nurse practitioner-led transitional care program has helped improve communication between hospital and community care providers and facilitated a timely transfer of patient information, according to a study of a two-year pilot project.
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has launched a new initiative to help improve care for patients from their hospital stay through their transition back to the community.
