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Hi, it’s Patrik Hutzel from Intensive Care at Home, where we provide tailor-made solutions for long-term ventilated adults and children with tracheostomies, and where we also provide tailor-made solutions for hospitals and intensive care units whilst providing quality services for long-term ventilated patients and medically complex patients at home, including home TPN (total parenteral nutrition) and IV fluids and IV antibiotics.

In last week’s blog, I talked about,

MY DAD CAN’T COME OFF THE VENTILATOR & TRACHEOSTOMY WITH MULTIPLE HEALTH ISSUES IN ICU. CAN HE GO HOME?

You can check out last week’s blog by clicking on the link below this video:

https://intensivecareathome.com/my-dad-cant-come-off-the-ventilator-tracheostomy-with-multiple-health-issues-in-icu-can-he-go-home/ 

In today’s blog post, I want to answer a question from one of our clients. 

Cerebral Palsy, Nasopharyngeal Airway, Deep Suctioning & BIPAP at Home, Why You Need ICU/PICU Nurses!

Hi, it’s Patrik Hutzel from Intensive Care at Home, where we provide tailor-made solutions for long-term ventilated adults and children with tracheostomies, and where we also provide tailor-made solutions for hospitals and intensive care units whilst providing quality services for long-term ventilated patients and medically complex patients at home, including home TPN (total parenteral nutrition) and IV fluids and IV antibiotics.

So, in last week’s blog, I talked about, “Can Intensive Care at Home help my sister on a ventilator with the tracheostomy and PEG, live a normal life at home?” You can check out last week’s blog by clicking on the link below this video.

In today’s blog post, I want to talk about, “Cerebral palsy, and deep suctioning, and BIPAP (bilevel positive airway pressure).” And the reason I want to bring this up is simply we are currently having an inquiry from a family who has a two-and-a-half-year-old boy at home with cerebral palsy. He needs regular deep suctioning with an NPA, a nasopharyngeal airway. He needs deep suctioning that means someone has to go down with a suction catheter into the lungs to get rid of all the secretions that, unfortunately, he can’t get rid of as part of his condition. He desaturates very frequently, which means he drops his oxygen saturation frequently beyond or below 90% of oxygen levels. Therefore, he’s at risk that he ends up with a hypoxic brain injury or some form of brain damage.

Furthermore, he’s on regular oxygen and most importantly, he has regular hospital readmissions now. Unfortunately, this client is funded only for support workers, and that’s funded through the NDIS (National Disability Insurance Scheme), and that is not only clinically unsafe, obviously. Clearly, support workers cannot keep him at home predictably because deep suctioning with a nasopharyngeal airway, even the insertion of a nasopharyngeal airway, should not be done by a support worker. It shouldn’t even be done by a general registered nurse. It’s an intensive care nursing skill, which is what we provide here at Intensive Care at Home.

We send intensive care nurses into the home predominantly for long-term ventilation and tracheostomy, but also for patients like this little boy who needs frequent deep suctioning. One of the parents of the little boy showed me a video of their very distressed son before he was going to hospital, before they called an ambulance after a night of deep suctioning that the parents provided. Again, they shouldn’t be providing that because they’re not trained in it.

Again, this is an intensive care nursing skill because you’re going with a suction catheter into someone’s lungs. You can’t just let anyone do that because a lot of damage can be done there if you’re not doing it correctly. And if you are doing it correctly, those children or even young adults stay at home predictably, because that’s all we do at Intensive Care at Home. We keep adults and children out of intensive care with our intensive care nursing skills that we bring into the community.

Now, as far as funding is concerned, the NDIS is funding nursing care even for intensive care nurses, but it has to go through the right advocacy. If you are an NDIS support coordinator and you’re watching this and you don’t know how to go about the advocacy, for example, if you are having a cerebral palsy client or any other client that needs intensive care nurses on the books, you should contact us. We can help you with the advocacy with the NDIS. We’ve done it millions of times. We wouldn’t be in business if the NDIS wouldn’t be funding nursing care, so please contact us.

But even if you are a family member and you’re in a similar situation, the NDIS is only funding you for support workers for ventilation, tracheostomy, deep suctioning, you should contact us as a matter of urgency. We know from experience that, and I’ve made videos about this in the past, that if you’re not having intensive care nurses, 24 hours a day, for these situations, that clients unfortunately will die, and the NDIS will try and sweep it under the carpet. And I have talked about this in other videos. This is a reality. We have the evidence for it. We’ve been involved in it, that the NDIS was trying to cut funding, and children have passed away under the guise of the NDIS saying there is no funding. Well, that costs lives.

Again, the NDIS, Bill Shorten, shout out to you. I know you’re busy trying to sweep it under the carpet, and children have died because of your lack of compassion. You think you can weigh up someone’s life with costs. You can’t weigh up someone’s life with money. People need to have a good quality of life and that can be achieved with intensive care nurses at home for the patients or for the clients that actually need it, and where it’s evidence-based. No one can tell me that deep suctioning with a support worker or even with a general registered nurse’s evidence-based.

What also often happens with cerebral palsies, once the nursing care is guaranteed and you have regular staff and we can keep help you keep your child or your loved one at home, predictably. Often with cerebral palsy, the next step is they often go on BIPAP as well. Those kids need BIPAP in the long run as well but we can help you with that as well. A support worker can’t really help you with that.

Bear in mind, using a support worker for tasks like ventilation, tracheostomy, deep suctioning, BIPAP or CPAP, it’s like flying the airplane with the cabin crew instead of the pilot. Basically, with support workers in the community, you’re picking people off the street and letting them do intensive care nursing tasks. That’s crazy and it’s dangerous. It ends up in hospital readmissions. It ends up with long-term damage for patients or it ends up with death. That’s how bluntly I can put it because we’ve seen it firsthand if the NDIS isn’t funding, but we can help you with that. We’ve always achieved getting the funding for our clients.

So, that’s my quick video today.

So, if you have a family member at home with insufficient support and you need nursing care, or if you have a loved one in intensive care, maybe with cerebral palsy or with other conditions and you want to go home, please contact us at intensivecareathome.com. We’re operating all around Australia and all major capital cities, including regional and remote areas. We’re also now branching out into the U.S., so please contact us on one of the numbers on the top of our website or simply send us an email to [email protected].

And if your loved one is at home and you have insufficient support, please contact us as well.

Now also, if you’re a critical care nurse, we want to hear from you. We have jobs all around Australia, but predominantly in Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne. Please contact us if you’re a critical care nurse with a minimum of two years ICU, PICU, ED experience. We want to hear from you. Also, we are an NDIS, TAC (Transport Accident Commission), iCare, DVA (Department of Veteran Affairs) approved community nursing service provider in Australia, please contact us.

If you are an intensive care specialist ICU consultant, we want to hear from you as well. We have an opening at the moment for a highly motivated ICU consultant working with us.

Now, subscribe to my YouTube channel for regular updates for families in intensive care and Intensive Care at Home, click the like button, click the notification bell, comment below what you want to see next, and share the video with your friends and families.

Thanks for watching.

This is Patrik Hutzel from intensivecareathome.com and I’ll talk to you in a few days.

Take care.