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My 65-Year-Old Brother’s Ventilated & Tracheostomy in the ICU & He’s 80km Away From Home, Can He Go Home?

If you want to know what to do if your critically ill loved one is in and out of ICU with ventilation and tracheostomy, stay tuned. I’ve got news for you.

My name is Patrik Hutzel from intensivecareathome.com and I have an email today from Luna who says,

“Hi Patrik,

My brother had a craniotomy after an aneurysm and a stroke. He has a tracheostomy. They’re trying to wean him off the ventilator. He’s paralyzed on his left side, and he can’t speak. He was speaking very softly about 3 weeks ago. Then he had a problem with the tracheostomy, so they sent him back to the hospital. They removed the tracheostomy and by Day 2, he couldn’t breathe. By Day 3, he was put back on the tracheostomy and he was back in ICU and sedated and he was sleeping for one week.

The problem is he is now awake, but the hospital is 60 miles away, for both ways from me and I can only go twice a week, and his girlfriend is with him every day in the morning, but it’s also 60 miles away for her. His sons don’t go and see him. I think he’s heartbroken and he has gone backwards in his rehabilitation.

I read to him, play music for him. He holds my hand, and I cry. He was a very active 65-year-old man, and now he doesn’t have the ability to hold the cup. I guess I have to trust the process, but we absolutely and desperately want him at home. Is this possible?”

Well, thank you so much for your email and yes, it is absolutely possible to get your brother home after all this time in ICU, especially if he’s sort of been going back and forth with tracheostomy in, tracheostomy out. It sounds to me like he is ready to go home after all this time and with Intensive Care at Home, we can help you with taking him home, no problem.

What are the steps here that you need to take to get your brother home? So first off, we need to talk more and find out exactly what is his current clinical status. But if he’s ventilator dependent and tracheostomy dependent, and he’s clinically stable, he’s off inotropes or vasopressors, he’s pretty much ready to go home and the weaning process can continue at home. That is actually a much better environment compared to an ICU environment.

Think about it. You’re in an ICU, you don’t have natural daylight. Sometimes patients are stuck in a bed space or a cubicle without natural daylight at all, and there’s no fresh air. It’s just not a very good environment for long-term patients. So, therefore, going home makes a lot of sense and people really thrive at home in terms of their quality of life at home.

It’s no surprise once they’re surrounded back with their families, you don’t have to drive 60 miles, and you’re mentioning your brother’s girlfriend is driving 60 miles, whatever the case may be. It’s not conducive for anyone staying in an ICU long-term. There are enough case studies on our website and testimonials to highlight the work that we are doing and how patients should be looked after at home instead of ICU.

So, the mechanics around it are as follows. Number one, ICUs need their beds. It’s the most sought-after bed in a hospital, the ICU bed. It’s also the most expensive bed in a hospital, the ICU bed. So, with the ICU bed being the most expensive bed with $5,000 to $6,000 per bed day, it is clear that someone wants to pay half of that, which is what Intensive Care at Home charges, roughly. We cut the cost of the intensive care bed by around 50%, and any funding body will have an interest in cutting the cost of an ICU bed by 50%.

On top of that, by freeing up the ICU bed, they can take in other patients into ICU. On top of that, and most importantly, with Intensive Care at Home, you and your family and your brother, most of all, will improve your quality of life and your brother’s quality of life. We’re bringing the intensive care into the home. That is much more patient and family-friendly and holistic compared to leaving patients in the ICU long-term. It’s as simple as that.

So, people often come to us and say, “Oh, what about the money? Well, what about the funding?” Well, someone is paying for your family member’s ICU bed, and they’re paying a lot of money. So, always keep that in mind that someone is paying for that ICU bed and it’s a lot of money. The funding bodies, in general, have an interest in cutting the cost of the ICU bed by around 50%. Like I said, I’ll come to more details about the funding bodies in Australia in particular towards the end of this video.

Equipment needs to be organized, of course, we can help with that. Of course, a team needs to be organized at home in your location, which once again, we are the experts on. We are creating teams in a home care environment all the time and we know what we need to look for to send you the right staff who are qualified, have the right mindset, right attitude, and so forth.

So, it is a fairly straightforward process, especially since we have a lot of experience with discharges from ICU to a home care environment, and it all comes down to selecting the right staff for the right client and making sure it’s done safely.

Now, with Intensive Care at Home, we are currently operating all around Australia in all major capital cities as well as in all regional and rural areas and we are sending our critical care nurses into the home, 24 hours a day. Therefore, we are providing a genuine alternative to a long-term stay in intensive care for ventilation and tracheostomy for adults and children. We’re also providing Intensive Care at Home for Home BIPAP (Bilevel Positive Airway Pressure), Home CPAP (Continuous Positive Airway Pressure), ventilation without tracheostomy. Also, we’re providing Home TPN (Total Parenteral Nutrition), home IV potassium infusions, home IV magnesium infusions, as well as PICC (Peripherally Inserted Central Catheter) line and central line line management, as well as Hickman’s line management, and port-a-cath management at home. We’re also providing ventilation weaning at home. We’re also providing nasogastric tube management and PEG (Percutaneous Endoscopic Gastrostomy) tube management at home. We’re also providing palliative care services at home.

We’re also sending our critical care nurses into the home for emergency department bypass services. We have done so successfully as part of the Western Sydney Local Area Health District, their in-touch program, saving approximately $2,000 per patient that we keep at home, instead of going to an emergency department.

We’re also cutting the cost of an intensive care bed by around 50% because the intensive care bed costs around $5,000 to $6,000 per bed day. Our service is around 50% of that and we’re freeing up the most sought-after and most expensive bed in the hospital, which is the intensive care bed. Most importantly however, we’re improving the quality of life for patients and their families. So, it’s a win-win situation for everyone and for all stakeholders.

We’re an NDIS (National Disability Insurance Scheme) approved service provider all around Australia, TAC (Transport Accident Commission) and WorkSafe in Victoria, iCare in New South Wales, NIISQ (National Injury Insurance Scheme in Queensland), as well as the Department of Veteran Affairs (DVA) all around Australia. Our clients and we, as a provider, have also received funding through public hospitals, private health funds, as well as departments of health.

We are the only service provider in Australia that has achieved third-party accreditation for Intensive Care at Home nursing in 2025. We have been achieving this high level of accreditation since 2012. No other provider has achieved this high level of accreditation in the community in Australia and has created more intellectual property for Intensive Care at Home nursing than we have. That puts us in a privileged position to employ hundreds of years of critical care nursing experience combined in the community. No other service provider in 2025 employs a higher skill level in the community than we do, which enables us to look after the highest acuity adults and children in the community in Australia safely.

Now, if you’re stuck in an ICU, like this gentleman is in our email from today, or if you’re at home already and you’re watching this, or you have a family member of course in hospital or in an ICU, and you realize that you don’t have the right level of support, and if you’re stuck in ICU and you understand that this is not the right environment, I’ll give you a very tangible example today how we can help you.

One of our first clients over 10 years ago was a client who was at home on a ventilator with a tracheostomy with a support worker model, 24 hours a day. Of course, support workers cannot look after clients at home on a ventilator with a tracheostomy. That is like flying the airplane with the cabin crew instead of the pilot because anyone on a ventilator with a tracheostomy is at very high risk of medical emergencies or dying if they don’t have critical care nurses at home looking after them 24/7, as is evidence-based, by the way, and documented in our Mechanical Home Ventilation Guidelines that you can find on our website at intensivecareathome.com.

Eventually, this client found out about us and also the hospital and the ICU that the client was regularly going back to and almost living in. We were able to take him home and prove our concept with Intensive Care at Home and save the funding body half of the cost of the intensive care bed. We proved that model within a couple of weeks, really, because when we worked with the client and we send him intensive care nurses, 24 hours a day, he never, ever went back into ICU ever again and the concept was proven.

We can do the same for you if you’re not safe at home, which includes the advocacy for funding that goes along with it. We have always successfully advocated for our clients, otherwise, we would not be in business.

This is also why we are providing Level 2 and Level 3 NDIS Support Coordination. We have a team of NDIS Support Coordinators, and they have a wealth of knowledge. I’ve done an interview with Amanda Riches, one of our NDIS Support Coordinators, and we’ll put a link to an interview with Amanda in the written version of this blog. We’re also providing TAC case management and WorkSafe case management in Victoria with Lucy McCotter.

If you’re an NDIS Support Coordinator or a case manager from another organization watching this, and you’re looking for nursing care for your participants, please reach out to us as well. If you’re looking for funding for nursing care for your participants and you don’t know how to go about it and what evidence to provide, I encourage you to reach out to us as well. We can help you with the right level of funding and with the right level of advocacy. We’re also providing NDIS specialist nursing assessments done by critical care nurses with a legal nurse consulting background.

If you are a critical care nurse and you’re looking for a career change, and you want to join a very progressive, dynamic, and high-performing team of critical care nurses in the community, we are employing hundreds of years of critical care nursing experience combined. You can join our high performing team. If you are looking for a career change, we’re currently hiring for jobs for critical care nurses in Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane, in Albury, Wodonga, in Bendigo, in Geelong, and in Warragul in Victoria. If you have worked in critical care nursing for a minimum of 2 years pediatric ICU, ED, and you have already completed a postgraduate critical care nursing qualification, we will be delighted hearing from you.

I have a disclaimer though, because we are offering a tailor-made solution for our clients, which includes regular staff, our clients do want the same staff coming over and over again because our clients are so vulnerable and so special, and that’s why we need regular staff. If you’re looking for agency work where you can come and go, this will not be the right fit for you. We are looking for consistency and our clients are looking for consistency. So please, only apply with us if you can give us regular and consistent availability for shifts and you’re really keen on building relationships with us and with our clients.

If you are an intensive care specialist or an ED specialist, we also want to hear from you. We’re currently expanding our medical team as well.

We can also help you eliminate your bed blocks in your ICU and ED for your long-term patients, or for your regularly readmitting patients with our critical care nursing team at home. We’re here to help you take the pressure off your ICU and ED beds. In most cases, you won’t even pay for it. Even if you do pay for it, it is much more cost-effective than what you’re paying for in ICU and ED.

If you’re a hospital executive watching this and you have bed blocks in your ICU, ED, respiratory wards, please reach out to us as well. We can help you there very fast.

If you’re in the U.S. or in the U.K. and you’re watching this and you need help, we want to hear from you as well. We can help you there privately with private nurses and with one-on-one consulting.

Once again, our website is intensivecareathome.com. Call us on one of the numbers on the top of our website or simply send us an email to [email protected].

If you like my videos, subscribe to my YouTube channel for regular updates for families with Intensive Care at Home and intensive care, click the like button, click the notification bell, share this video with your friends and families, and leave your comments below what you want to see next, what you think about today’s topic, and what insights you have from today’s video.

Thank you so much for watching.

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

Take care for now.