When you think of a doctor making house calls, you likely think of old fashioned medicine. Maybe you even are thinking about a primitive, frontier style of medicine, like what was practiced back in the days of the Wild West. However, with all of the changes that have occurred in our lives because of the coronavirus pandemic that we are living through right now, some care experts are indicating that medical house calls are not just an antiquated style of care, but might even be the wave of the future.
A new piece of evidence that indicates that this could be the case is a recent look at house call radiology. This service was provided to about 1,000 elderly folk in a rural part of Indiana. It was shown to be incredibly helpful at reaching people. Not only was this shown to be cost effective thanks to advanced technology, it helped to reduce emergency department visit use by 77 percent for these types of visits. Readmission rates were lowered by about 50 percent when this model of care was put into practice.
This is an important breakthrough. Although the emergency department serves a very important function, it is also overused. ER doctors are often some of the most overworked professionals in the field, and the type of care that they provide also happens to be very expensive. Even if the individual does not pay for the care themselves, someone does. Unfortunately, this also leads to a difficulty for a lot of emergency departments to be able to efficiently handle real medical emergencies. If you remember the motto “flatten the curve,” this is one of the things that was aimed at. By reducing the number of people that will be seeking care at any one time, doctors will be better able to handle an influx of COVID-19 cases.
With that in mind, the new wave of success that home visits have seen is even more important.
There’s something to be said about bringing care directly to the person that needs it. Although we often pride ourselves in being independent, for the elderly, this is not always possible. The challenges that have been brought to light because of the coronavirus have made transportation issues even more prevalent. Having access to care right within your own home makes life easier when situations like this exist.
And that’s exactly what we do with in-home care. This type of senior care that we specialize in is not medical care like some other types of home visits might be, but it places an emphasis on the same model of assistance. It allows the elderly to live their life as normally as possible by bringing help to them. When going out or leaving home altogether might prove to be bad for health, this helps to provide a safeguard for vulnerable individuals.
If you’d like to learn more about this, please let us know. One of our trained caregivers would be delighted to connect with you and explain how in-home care works and how it might benefit you and your family.
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