Transforming Hospitals: Designing for Safety and Quality

Transforming Hospitals: Designing for Safety and Quality, a DVD from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ), reviews the case for evidence-based hospital design and how it increases patient and staff satisfaction and safety, quality of care, and employee retention, and results in a positive return on investment.

This summary discusses evidence-based design, patient safety and satisfaction, quality outcomes, staff satisfaction and retention, and cost effectiveness.

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Caring for an elder exacts financial toll

The out-of-pocket cost of caring for an aging parent, spouse or loved one averages about $5,500 a year, according to the nation’s first in-depth study of such expenses, a sum that is more than double previous estimates and more than the average American household spends annually on health care and entertainment combined.

Family members responsible for ailing loved ones provide not only “hands-on” care but often reach into their own pockets to pay for many other expenses of care recipients, including groceries, household goods, drugs, medical co-payments and transportation. That nudges the average cost of providing long-distance care to $8,728 a year.

Poll Shows Long-Term Care An Issue In Presidential Election

More than eight out of 10 people want long term care included in the agenda of presidential candidates, according to a poll by Public Opinion Strategies and the Mellman Group.

It also showed that nearly 70 percent of respondents have not prepared for the long-term care of their family or themselves. However, half of the polltakers indicated that they have known someone who has needed such care.

The poll results also suggested that Americans are willing to aid in long-term care programs at the state and national levels. More than half of the respondents agreed that payroll deductions for such programs would be allowable.

Washington Scrutinizes Nursing Homes

WASHINGTON, Nov. 15 — Lawmakers in two hearings on Thursday proposed ways to force nursing homes to provide more details about ownership and to hold those owners more accountable when problems emerge.

The hearings were prompted in part by concerns that quality at nursing homes was declining as large chains were acquired by private investment groups.

Members of the House Ways and Means Health Subcommittee and the Senate Special Committee on Aging proposed measures to require nursing homes to disclose ownership and to require regulators to release information about poorly managed homes.

Kerry N. Weems, the acting administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, which regulates nursing homes, offered several initiatives to improve oversight. His suggestions included releasing the so-called special focus facility list, which identifies homes that regulators consider among the nation’s worst. That list, which will be released Dec. 1, has not been public.

Creating The Most Comprehensive Long-Term Care Database

More than 1.4 million Americans live in nursing homes today. By 2020, an estimated 12 million will need long-term care, whether in a nursing home, assisted living facility, chronic care hospital or from an at-home health service provider.

At this time of skyrocketing demand for long-term care, the National Institute on Aging has awarded Brown University a major grant to create the first research database aimed at improving the nation's long-term care system -- and the lives of the elderly who rely on that system to eat, take medications and carry out other tasks of daily living.

Vincent Mor, chairman of the Department of Community Health at Brown and a member of the University's Center for Gerontology and Health Care Research, is principal investigator on the five-year, $10-million grant. Mor and his team will take existing federal data on Medicare reimbursement claims, patient hospitalization rates and other data and combine it with new information the team will collect on the health status of residents, reimbursement rates for long-term care services, the organization of those services, and other topics from a random sample of 2,600 nursing homes across the country. The group will also collect information on relevant policies from all 50 states.

FDA Seeks To Include Those Most Affected By Alzheimer's Disease In The Drug Review Process

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has expanded its Patient Consultant and Patient Representative programs to include individuals in the early stages of Alzheimer's disease and their caregivers. The FDA made the change in response to a request by the Alzheimer's Association encouraging the agency to give people directly affected by Alzheimer's a more active role in the review and approval of new Alzheimer drugs.

"People who are living with this terrible disease have much to offer to the pharmaceutical industry, researchers and government regulators, and their voices must be heard," said Harry Johns, president and CEO of the Alzheimer's Association. "We are pleased that the FDA understands the value of involving Alzheimer families in regulatory decisions that affect them and appreciate that the agency was so responsive in expanding their patient consultant program."

Stark Announces Hearing on Trends in Nursing Home Ownership and Quality

House Ways and Means Health Subcommittee Chairman Pete Stark (D-CA) announced today that the Subcommittee will hold a hearing to examine the effect of nursing home ownership trends on nursing home quality and accountability. The hearing will take place at 10:00 a.m. on Thursday, November 15, 2007, in Room 1100, Longworth House Office Building.

In view of the limited time available to hear witnesses, oral testimony at this hearing will be from invited witnesses only. However, any individual or organization not scheduled for an oral appearance may submit a written statement for consideration by the Subcommittee and for inclusion in the printed record of the hearing.

AMA Adopts New Policies On Disabled Patient Care

AMA supports reforms for disabled patients: The AMA passed new policy supporting Medicaid reforms that would provide disabled patients with equal access to home and community-based services so that they can live as independently as possible. The AMA supports passage of congressional legislation, the Community Choice Act of 2007, that would achieve these goals. This policy was recommended to the AMA by the American Academy of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation and the American Association of Neuromuscular and Electrodiagnostic Medicine.

"People with disabilities who rely on Medicaid should not have to choose between the important care they need and the ability to live independently," said AMA Board Member Rebecca J. Patchin, MD. "We support Medicaid reforms so that disabled patients, together with their physicians, can decide where the best place is to receive medical care and support based on patients' individual needs."

Choice Cuts Costs in Medicaid Programs

States are finding choice is one way to cut costs as America ages.

Policymakers are learning citizens want choice when it comes to long-term care of the graying population.

Marc Gold, director of the Promoting Independence Initiative in the Texas Department of Aging and Disability Services, said the cost of nursing home care is about twice the cost of similar services in community-based care.

“Community care is not only about human choice, not only about individual choice, not only about quality of life, or quality of care,” he said. “Not only is it the preferred model. It’s about saving money.”