Blog Archives

Is Post-Acute Care Dropping the Ball on Hospital Readmissions?

Research on hospital readmission rates—particularly readmissions involving Medicare patients—is a relatively new demand, having emerged with the Affordable Care Act in 2010 when the federal government began implementing fines and penalties to hospitals with high preventable readmission rates, the goal being an $8 billion reduction of unnecessary government healthcare spending. With the government placing fullRead the Rest…

Better Nursing Staff Handoffs May Lead to Improving Patient Care

National attention on reducing the rate of hospital readmissions has begun to narrow its focus on the role of hospital nursing staff handoffs, whose performance, researchers say, may be key to improving patient care and reducing the Medicare budget. However, more studies show that ensuring quality nursing staff handoffs is not a priority for mostRead the Rest…

Hospital Readmission Rates Predicted with Automatic Tool

A new development in automated communication technology makes it easier for healthcare professionals to prevent hospital readmissions, and may even help prompt hospitals’ slow transition to ACOs. As of December 2013, University of Pennsylvania Health System successfully incorporated an automated prediction tool that recognizes newly admitted patients who are at risk for being readmitted withinRead the Rest…

Steps to Providing Quality Patient Care and Reducing Hospital Readmissions

There’s no doubt about it: In order to reduce hospital readmissions, hospitals have to place a stronger emphasis on quality patient care. But what exactly does this mean? Given that 50% of hospitals report that they fail to follow through on readmission reduction initiatives, it seems that this issue needs further clarification. We recently reportedRead the Rest…

Examples of Hospital Readmissions Penalties Paid

After repeated miscalculations, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services has discovered errors in the figures it initially reported as part of their effort to reduce hospital readmissions, otherwise known as the Hospital Readmission Reduction Program. Reimbursement penalties previously unaccounted for are estimated to total approximately $280 million that must be reimbursed to the governmentRead the Rest…

An Understandable View of the Hospital Readmissions Reduction Program

Even for the most experienced hospital teams, Medicare programs are difficult to unravel. There’s no question that the recent changes to Medicare are some of the most difficult, especially the initiative to reduce hospital readmissions. However, no matter if you’re a caretaker or a patient, if you work with Medicare your future depends on makingRead the Rest…

Why Hospital Readmissions Sometimes Occur

Results from a new national study reveal an excessive number of hospital readmissions for Medicare patients. A team of researchers from The Dartmouth Institute have been working together on a five-year study about post hospital care and they see the causes for readmissions completely avoidable with proper post hospital care. This study, called the DartmouthRead the Rest…