AARP Magazine Supporting Caregivers

Click on this link to view the full article in AARP Magazine.

IAFP member, Thomas Cornwell, MD's decades-long career has focused on home-based care, including federal advocacy, nationwide training programs and global outreach to teach others how to provide safe and comprehensive care in patients homes with better outcomes and lower costs.  He had an opportunity to interview with AARP Magazine on the importance of training and supporting caregivers who provide medical tasks at home.  The story published on September 30.  Exerpts below. 

As care shifts out of hospitals and rehabilitation centers, patients are being discharged sooner and with higher medical needs, leaving families to handle procedures that nurses once performed. Cost and coverage limits, such as Medicare’s cap on paid rehab days, compound the problem by sending patients home before caregivers are fully prepared.

“At the same time, a shortage of home health nurses and aides experienced in advanced tasks like tracheostomies and catheters, and rehab centers waiting until the last minute to train caregivers, means many caregivers receive little or no professional support before taking on these responsibilities,” says Dr. Thomas Cornwell, a family physician and executive chairman at the Home Centered Care Institute, who has provided house calls for thousands of patients over the years in the Chicago suburbs and across the country.

According to Cornwell, being able to handle routine procedures, such as clearing or reinserting a feeding tube when it becomes obstructed or dislodged, can help families avoid unnecessary emergency room visits. “I always teach my caregivers how to change feeding tubes during routine changes so in the event an emergent replacement is needed, they can call and I can take them through it,” he says.