The state of healthcare is constantly changing. Over the last 10 years and even more so since the pandemic there has been a return to House Calls. House calls program for seniors are promising and are focused on patient-centric care at an affordable cost. With a growth in at-home care, it simplifies the process for seniors to recieve necessary medical attention, conduct scheduled exams, diagnostic tests, and non-medical needs-related services at their doorstep. Doctors, nurse practitioners, physician attendants, and other providers when visiting and treating seniors at their home environment, one of the primary benefits includes the customization of services that can be altered according to patient needs.
The essentiality of House Calls can be used to offer various solution ranging from providing preventive medicines to complex chronic care management. These house calls can be performed by various medical professionals and offer a plethora of services that include primary care, skilled nursing care, scheduled follow-ups, physical therapy, occupational therapy, speech therapy, palliative care services, transitional care, medication management, counseling for health, nutrition, and diabetic patients.
The main benefit of in-home medical care for the senior population is that it helps keep patients out of hospitals, emergency rooms, and nursing homes.
Significance of House Calls Programs
With house calls program making a comeback in this pandemic, it has gained momentum and visibility amidst patients and providers. House calls programs assist in maintaining low cost by offering high-quality comprehensive care to the senior population.
Primary care house calls program offers on-site and hassle free visits where providers can meet and communicated with their patients at their designated locations. This can include home spaces, independent living situations, or an assisted living environments. House calls program aims to reduce wait time and offer proper transportation services. Every provider follows thorough protocols to ensure patient safety and provides proper care treatment and diagnosis facilities in the comfort of their homes.
Having a proper communication channel with patients and their family members including previous care providers, can assist in enhances care treatment for long-term well-being for seniors. With a desginated chronic care management team, offering at-home care services are simplified and boosts patient confidence in care services. Quality of preventive care is essential to the health and well-being of each patients. Monitoring the conditions and identifying risk factors can help with early care services for senior patients.
Let’s understand why house calls programs are important for the senior population.
Why Are House Calls So Important for Senior Citizens?
House calls provide senior citizens with:
- High-quality care typically lasting for 45-60 minutes.
- Keeping them in comfortable environment reducing chances of infection exposure.
- Offers a central point of coordination for other health-related services.
- Assists in keeping patients out of ER visits.
- Reduces stress for care givers by providing transportation and care services.
- Reduces healthcare and long-term care expenses.
- Offers an increase in independence for both patients and providers.
More than this there is another layer to care that can be provided at home that cannot be given in an emergency room or even with months of doctors' visits. When an at-home provider comes to the patient, they can assess their home for any obvious problems that may be adding to their illnesses. Everything from how many pets are living in the home to whether the patient is dealing with loneliness can tell a care provider what else may be the cause of or a contributing factor in their injury or illness.
In-home providers will have access to the patients' health records, they can give a holistic view after studying any recent hospitalizations, laboratory results, x-rays, CT scans, assessing the patient's lifestyle, and after taking their time to listen to the patient. They can offer immediate care for a vast number of things from wound care to antibiotics.
It’s time that we embrace at-home care via same-day house calls, and other homecare services. In a recent evaluation, we can see the majority of the senior population lives in a home. For non-life-threatening services, same-day house calls can be the solution.
Instead of waiting in an uncomfortable room with other sick people, patients could use their phone to directly contact their provider, request a house call, and their care begins immediately with questions to get an assessment of the situation. They can also let them know if they do need to go to the emergency room or if the provider can send someone on their way. A skilled physician’s assistant can supply much of the care one would get in the emergency room. From food poisoning to wound care and at-home call can bring much of the care, one would be provided within the emergency room. From IV fluids to prescriptions these skilled providers can give patients the same level of care, at a reduced cost, and all in the comfort of their own homes.
Bottomline
For elderly patients, this can be an even better way for health care to be delivered. Keeping the elderly comfortable and not disrupting their routines can lead to better health and better overall results. Replacing the excessive cost of emergency room visits with personalized, lower-cost care in the home is what patients want and it is the future of healthcare. It allows medical professionals to provide better care and patients to receive faster results.
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