Patient discharge

Background: Readable discharge instructions may help caregivers understand and implement care plans following hospitalization. Many caregivers of hospitalized children, however, have limited literacy. We aimed to increase the percentage of discharge instructions written at 7th grade level or lower for hospital medicine patients from 13% to 80% in 6 months.

Background: Facilitating successful care transitions across settings is a key nursing competency. Although we have achieved improvements in acute stroke care, similar advances in stroke care transitions in the postacute and return to community phases have lagged far behind. In the current delivery system, care transitions are often ineffective and inefficient resulting in unmet needs and high rates of unnecessary complications and avoidable hospital readmissions.

Background: Family support is internationally recognised as integral to palliative care. However, during end of life care discharge planning from hospital, families report a lack of opportunity to discuss their concerns or contribute their knowledge of the ill family member and consequently feel unheard and unsupported.

Context: Hospital-to-home transitions, particularly at the end of life, can be challenging for patients and their family caregivers. Therefore, there is a need to better understand gaps in expectations and experiences of these transitions. Theory can inform the creation of an intervention aimed at improving the hospital-to-home transition.

Objective: To evaluate the effect of an educational intervention on family caregivers of adults with cancer who are in the postoperative period of oncological surgery, to strengthen the competence of home care and reduce overload.

Background: Informal carers are essential in enabling discharge home from hospital at end of life and supporting palliative patients at home, but are often ill-prepared for the role. Carers' support needs are rarely considered at discharge. If carers are less able to cope with home care, patient care may suffer and readmission may become more likely. Aim: To investigate the implementation of an evidence-based Carer Support Needs Assessment Tool (CSNAT) intervention to support carers during hospital discharge at end of life.

Background: Delayed hospital discharge occurs when patients are medically cleared but remain hospitalized because a suitable care setting is not available. Delayed discharge typically results in reduced levels of treatment, placing patients at risk of functional decline, falls and hospital‐related adverse events. Caregivers often take on an active role in hospital to mitigate these risks. Objective: This scoping review aimed to summarize the literature on patient and caregiver experiences with delayed hospital discharge.

Background: there are many people with advanced cancer who are cared for in the community, though little is known about patients' and family members' lived experiences during discharge from hospital to home. Objectives: to describe the experiences of the patient-family caregiver dyad during the transition from hospital to home at a National Cancer Institute in Colombia. Methods: a descriptive phenomenological approach was taken for this study.

Purpose. To expand understanding of informal stroke care-giving, validated tools previously used in Hong Kong and in the UK were used with Australian stroke carers to assess their stroke-related knowledge, perceived needs, satisfaction with services received and sense of burden after stroke patients' discharge home from acute hospital care.

Methods. Record audit and telephone interviews with two cohorts of 32 carers recruited in Sydney and Brisbane 1 and 3 months post-hospital discharge, using validated scales and open questions in May–July 2006.

In 2006 the Scottish Government provided just over £8 million to help 32 health and social care partnerships to develop telecare services. This paper presents a summary of the 2007-2008 evaluation of the Scottish Telecare Development. This evaluation focused on measuring overall program progress toward eight predefined Scottish Telecare Development objectives. Results indicate that the initial investment has resulted in significant savings to the health and social care sectors.