Literature Review

Team of caring nurses help end-of-life patients fulfill wedding dreams by arranging hospital ceremoniesPeople, by Erin Clack; 1/30/24Natasha Steels-Webb and her colleagues came up with the idea to create boxes filled with wedding essentials to pull off hospital ceremonies. "Myself and a colleague decided to create the wedding box after a patient we were caring for had become very unwell and it was clear she was not going to recover," Steels-Webb said in a post on the North West Anglia NHS Foundation Trust's website. "She had been with her current partner for many years, but they just hadn't got around to getting married — and this was something they both wanted," she continued.

Viewpoint: Care fragmentation, care continuity, and care coordination—How they differ and why it mattersJAMA Intern Med., by Lisa M. Kern, MD, MPH; Julie P. W. Bynum, MD, MPH; Harold Alan Pincus, MD; 1/29/24Health care in the US is characterized by fragmentation, with many patients seeing multiple physicians. Indeed, 35% of Medicare beneficiaries saw 5 or more physicians in 2019.1 Having multiple physicians may be appropriate, but it may also lead to medical errors, unnecessary visits, avoidable hospitalizations, and suboptimal care if all of the physicians do not have complete information about the patient and each other’s care plans.

Steward Texas medical center closing campusBecker's Hospital CFO Report, by Madeline Ashley; 1/25/24Port Arthur-based the Medical Center of Southeast Texas, part of Dallas-based Steward Health Care, is closing its Beaumont campus, including its emergency department and all hospital-related services, effective Feb. 2.

New program to provide emergency funding to rural hospitalsCapitol Beat, by Dave Williams; 1/17/24A nonprofit health-care organization announced plans ... to help financially struggling rural hospitals in Georgia in danger of closing. Ohio-based CareSource will contribute $5 million in emergency funding to hospitals and hospital-owned nursing homes in rural communities suffering critical cash deficits. Working in partnership with Cumming-based HomeTown Health, which represents rural hospitals across Georgia, the CareSource Rural Access Advancement Program will provide bridge loans to be repaid and reinvested into the program once the recipient has stabilized. Since 2010, nine rural hospitals have closed in Georgia, third-most in the nation.

Healthgrades' 50 top hospitals for 2024Becker's Hospital Review, by Mariah Taylor; 1/23/24Healthgrades has recognized 250 hospitals nationwide for exceptional care via its "America's Best Hospitals" awards, released Jan. 23. Three lists feature America's 50, 100 and 250 best hospitals, which represent the top 1 percent, 2 percent and 5 percent of hospitals in the nation, respectively.

To tackle financial distress, hospitals, health systems are turning to mergersKFF Health News; 1/19/24Modern Healthcare looks into the phenomenon of rising health care mergers and acquisitions being driven by financial pressures on health providers in the aftermath of the pandemic. Separately, Stateline explains how private equity-backed hospitals can see cutbacks and closures.

Increasing longevity, decreasing health quality: A close look at American health trendsBNN, by Ayesha Mumtaz; 1/16/24Recent data paints a concerning picture of Americans’ health despite an increase in longevity. While people are living longer, the quality of their health during these extended years is deteriorating. 

MedPAC approves hospital, physician pay bump; Doubles down on post-acute cutsInsideHealth Policy, by Bridget Early; 1/12/24Congress’ Medicare pay advisors recommended pay raises in 2025 for hospitals and physicians along with extra so-called Medicare safety-net pay and voted Thursday ... to recommend a second year’s worth of post-acute pay cuts as it approved proposals that would lower base pay rates for skilled nursing facilities, home health agencies and inpatient rehabilitation facilities. 

Hospital study on AI identifies undiagnosed dementia patients coming from LTCMcKnights Senior Living, by Aaron Dorman; 1/16/24A high number of senior living and care residents have dementia on admission, or develop it during their stay, despite never receiving a formal diagnosis. When these “secret” dementia patients, however, have an emergency – say, a fall – and are hospitalized, they can catch the new care team unaware and struggling to make appropriate clinical decisions. To avoid this pitfall, new research is looking at electronic health records to flag individuals who might have dementia, possibly undiagnosed, so that when they arrive at a hospital, the care team is ready. 

Creative thinking needed to save rural hospitalsSouth Dakota Searchlight, by Tom Dean; 1/14/24Over the last 15 years, approximately 150 rural hospitals have closed nationwide. What does it mean? Are these facilities obsolete, no longer needed?  Maybe in a few places, but in the vast majority of communities they provide critically important services. 

Construction of Hospice Care evaluation system for terminally ill patients in ICUPubMed, Patient Prefer Adherence, by Qin-Ling Wang et.al; 1/10/24Conclusion: In this study, three rounds of Delphi consultation methods were used to construct an evaluation index system for the nursing quality of hospice care for ICU patients. The evaluation indicators formulated closely focus on the physiological and psychological characteristics of ICU patients, which can provide a better reference for ICU patients with advanced life in the future.

Rural hospitals are caught in an aging-infrastructure conundrumFortune, by Markian Hawryluk and KFF Health News; 1/11/24Kevin Stansbury, the CEO of Lincoln Community Hospital in the 800-person town of Hugo, Colorado, is facing a classic Catch-22: He could boost his rural hospital’s revenues by offering hip replacements and shoulder surgeries, but the 64-year-old hospital needs more money to be able to expand its operating room to do those procedures.

Is healthcare relying too much on family caregivers?Modern Healthcare, by Diane Eastabrook; 1/10/24The Biden administration is demanding hospitals offer more clarity to family members on their role in home-based services. Access requires a subscription to Modern Healthcare