'Home first' model aims to stop patients being stranded on hospital wards

The quicker older people get out of hospital, the less likely they’ll end up in residential homes or back on a ward

With winter looming, health and care teams are being urged to radically overhaul discharge procedures to prevent patients being left stranded on hospital wards. New approaches are yielding striking results that could help avert a beds crisis – and improve older people’s chances of continuing to live independently.

The latest thinking on hospital discharge is to get people home and then carry out assessment of their support needs and rehabilitation. Hospital trusts and their community health and social care partners are being encouraged to adopt a “discharge-to-assess” (D2A) or “home-first” model.

Related: Hospital to home: people's needs must be central to transfers of care | Paul Burstow

Related: Hospital discharge is not rocket science. Why are patients still being failed?

Continue reading... October 10, 2017 at 06:10PM