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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 & Children with Tracheostomies by improving their Quality of life and where we also provide tailor made solutions to hospitals and Intensive Care Units to save money and resources, whilst providing Quality Care!
In the last blog I shared
DO INTENSIVE CARE UNITS HAVE A “ONE SIZE FITS ALL” APPROACH WHEN IT COMES TO DYING?
You can check out last week’s blog here!
In this week’s blog I want to share
INTENSIVE CARE AT HOME: Better home care solutions for long-term ventilated adults & children with tracheostomies!
We are finding mainly four or five scenarios when people come to us at INTENSIVE CARE AT HOME and want our service
1) Long-term ventilated adults or children with tracheostomies are at home already and are looked after by non-specialised, non-accredited and cheap service providers who can’t predictably keep them out of Intensive Care, because of their lack of skills, lack of knowledge and lack of specialisation.
Therefore Patients and their families quality of life suffers. Patients can’t optimize and can’t maximize their quality of life and they can’t maximize their opportunities in life such as going back to work, school, university etc…
Their families are unable to maximize their quality of life as well, because they are dealing with unreliable and non-specialized services and therefore they feel like they can’t leave their loved ones alone at home. This puts huge strains on the quality of life for other family members.
Patients predictably go back to ICU on a regular basis, because non-specialized and non-accredited service providers can’t deliver a quality and reliable service.
2) Long-term ventilated adults or children with tracheostomies are at home already and are mainly looked after by family members without any funding and without any support because of the lack of advocacy for the Patients and families on ventilators. Discharging hospitals or discharging facilities blame the “lack of funding” for the lack of care they are providing. This is where the system is failing its very people. In those situations, long-term ventilated adults & children with tracheostomies are predicably going back to ICU on a regular basis, costing the health system Millions of unnecessary $$$ Dollars per year
3) They have a loved one in Intensive Care on a ventilator with tracheostomy for many weeks or many months and they simply want their loved one at home, because they realize that Intensive Care Units can’t provide their loved one with the quality of life they want, need and deserve. Furthermore, families are sick of spending day and night in Intensive Care. They are putting their lives on hold and they often stop producing an income. They therefore realize that home care is a much better option and a win-win for everyone!
4) They have a loved one in Long-term acute care(LTAC) or even in a nursing home on a ventilator with tracheostomy and just like in 2) there is no quality of life in a long-term acute care facility or in a nursing home they simply don’t want their family member in an institution and they don’t want to spend day and night in an institution and they want to be at home.
5) They have their loved one in an end of life situation in Intensive Care and they want their loved one to die at home rather than in Intensive Care (I.e. surveys have revealed that 75% of the population in first world countries want to die at home if given a choice and yet less than 15 % actually do die at home, leaving a huge gap between what people want and what the health system is able to give them)
The good news is that we can help in all of the aforementioned difficult situations and I will show you how.
In situation 1) where you or your loved one may be at home on a ventilator already and the services you are getting are not meeting quality standards that are needed to predictably keep you or your family member out of Intensive Care, we can help you very quickly.
We have worked with Clients where we took over from non-specialized and non-accredited service providers because clients were going back to ICU regularly and we put a stop to their ICU readmissions overnight. No more ICU readmissions since we’ve worked with them. Why?
Because we are an accredited and specialized INTENSIVE HOME CARE nursing service that has a proven system and a proven frame work for keeping our Clients out of Intensive Care.
This is way more cost effective in the long run, rather than trying to engage a non-accredited and non-specialized service provider that may be cheaper but that’s costing more in the long run because Patients are going back to Intensive Care on a regular basis and therefore are at much higher risk of getting an infection…
Furthermore, regular ICU readmissions will not help you or your family member to maximize quality of life, which is what we are all about.
We can predictably and safely keep you or your loved one at home because we work with a third party accredited quality manual to provide INTENSIVE CARE AT HOME services.
We have showcased this in one of our case studies here, where we helped a client to go from 2-3 regular readmissions to Intensive Care a week, to zero readmissions to Intensive Care as soon as we started working with the client.
This has helped the client to dramatically improve their quality of life and we’ve helped them to find voluntary work that will eventually lead to paid work.
This is a good case study because it shows how we can deliver on our number one KPI (=Key performance indicator), which is zero readmissions back to hospital.
Related article/video:
2) Next, if you or your loved one is at home on a ventilator with tracheostomy already and if you or your family member has been discharged with no or little support and they have cited the lack of funding being responsible for those circumstances, we can definitely help you!
Again, we can predictably keep you or your family member out of Intensive Care and give you and your family the care you want, need and deserve!
As you can see on our website, we are also advocates for our clients and their families and most clients and their families also don’t know how to negotiate funding.
Again, we can help you with all of those aspects.
3) If you or your loved one is in Intensive Care and is on a ventilator with tracheostomy and has been in Intensive Care for many weeks or many months, you have come to the right place again.
You or your family member would have noticed by now that you or your family member have no quality of life in Intensive Care.
By going home, we can improve your quality of life dramatically and we can help you achieve your life goals!
For a family this also means that you don’t need to spend day and night in Intensive Care and you can be in the comfort of your own home!
You as a family can’t afford to spend day and night in Intensive Care putting your life on hold. By taking your loved one home with a specialized and accredited service like INTENSIVE CARE AT HOME, you will be able to function again as a family because your life will be in the comfort of your own home and not in the discomfort of an Intensive Care Unit!
You and your family can resume more quality of life, you will be able to go back to work once your loved one is at home and you don’t have to put your life, your career and other family relations on hold once your loved one is being looked after at home!
This usually also works well from an Intensive Care perspective. The Intensive Care bed that you or your loved one is occupying costs around $5,000 per bed day, whereas INTENSIVE CARE AT HOME costs around 50% of the hospital stay.
It’s a win-win situation. Health funding agencies pay half of the cost and you or your family member can be at home with an improved quality of life! Makes perfect sense, doesn’t it?
Furthermore, Intensive Care beds are in demand. They are precious, expensive and scarce resources. Therefore, Intensive Care Units have a natural tendency to minimize the average length of stay of their Patients.
Again, we are creating a win-win situation here for all stakeholders!
4) If you or your loved one is in a long-term acute care facility(LTAC) or in a nursing home you know that this is not the right place for you or your family member.
You have been hoping to go home soon but it hasn’t eventuated yet. Again, we can help and we can help you and your family to improve your quality of life and get you out of long-term acute care(LTAC) or out of a nursing home!
Again, we can help you maximize your and your families’ quality of life and we can get you home.
5)You or your family member might be in an end of -life situation in Intensive Care and you or your family member is ventilated.
You and your family know that all hospitals and Intensive Care Units can provide is a “one size fits all” end of life situation.
Related article/video:
DO INTENSIVE CARE UNITS HAVE A “ONE SIZE FITS ALL” APPROACH TO DYING IN ICU?
And again, given that 75% of the population in first world countries are wanting to die at home if given a choice and given that less than 15% actually do die at home, there is a huge gap between what mainstream health services are delivering and what people actually want!
We can close that gap and we can help you have an end of life situation on your terms, where your needs to be in the comfort of your own home, surrounded by your family are met!
Furthermore, you and your family will most likely have cultural, religious and/or spiritual needs that can’t be met by an Intensive Care Unit.
Again, to showcase you on how we can help you and your family, check out this case study here, where we helped a lady to spent the last year of her life at home, surrounded by her family even though she had a tracheostomy, was intermittently ventilated and had chemotherapy!
Related article/video:
What do you think? Do you think INTENSIVE CARE AT HOME is A BETTER solution for long-term ventilated adults & children with tracheostomies? Leave your comments on the blog.
If you want to find out how we can help you to get your loved one out of Intensive Care or Long-term acute care(also nursing home) or if you find that you have insufficient support for your loved one at home on a ventilator or if you have any questions please send me an email to [email protected] or call on one of the numbers below.
USA/Canada +1 415-915-0090
Australia/New Zealand +61 41 094 2230
UK/Ireland +44 118 324 3018
Also, check out our careers section here
www.intensivecareathome.com/careers
We are also a NDIS, TAC(Victoria) and DVA(Department of Veteran affairs) approved community service provider in Australia.
Thank you for tuning into this week’s blog.
This is Patrik Hutzel from INTENSIVE CARE AT HOME and I see you again next week in another update!