Nursing homes need telemedicine. Telemedicine saves lives, with statistics revealing that post-acute nursing home patients, who don’t see physicians or advanced practice nurses, are 2x more likely to be readmitted to the hospital or die within 30 days. Shockingly, among patients admitted to nursing facilities for post-acute care, 1 in 10 of them do not see a doctor or advanced nurse practitioner.
An unchanged stipulation from, when the majority of nursing home residents were long-term, medicare still necessitates that residents visit a physician within their first month of admission. 20% of hospitalized patients are discharged to nursing homes for post-acute care and these patients need more medical intervention than long-term residents, including physical therapy, intravenous antibiotics, and skilled wound care among others. On average patients wait 3.2 days to see a physician but in rural nursing homes, the wait stretches to 8.1 days.
The answer is telemedicine. Giving nursing homes on-site care, telemedicine is especially optimal for small or rural facilities, providing a scalable solution for facilities that can’t employ onsite clinical staff. For large facilities, telehealth augments onsite clinical staff for round-the-clock care. 83% of health issues can be treated by a telemedicine physician working with on-site nursing staff, reducing hospitalization to 17% of acute encounters. With reduced hospitalization comes greater nursing home occupancy, and with telemedicine, hospital admittances can be reduced by 70% for nursing homes.
Give nursing home residents the care and access to medical professionals they need and deserve. Improve your nursing home’s medical care with telemedicine.
Via TapestryHealth.com