External Influences
To improve benefits, Medicare and Medicaid, laws that support caregivers, and other regulations related to family care, advocates gather data that tells those in power our story. Understanding who provides care and under what circumstances helps patient and caregiver advocates campaign for improvements in laws and regulations. Find out the latest survey data about how caregiving impacts finances, employment, personal health, and more. In addition, discover how shortages in hospital staffing promote early patient discharge home with the expectation that families provide the recovery care. Plans are under consideration for moving to community care with home visits and the family home as the site of care.
Caregiving Data
Organizations gather data to tell their stories to influence government officials to change laws and regulations or encourage sponsors to support needy causes with donations. Through sharing data, decision-makers become aware of the link between providing care 24/7 and declining health, lost jobs, declining family relationships, ruined finances, and isolation. Find out more about what the most current surveys tell us about caregivers.
Healthcare Staffing Crisis
In today’s job market, college graduates enter the marketplace seeking positions that offer independent work, high pay, self-scheduling with lots of free time, access to technology, the ability to offer alternate points of view. Unfortunately, healthcare positions require the opposite. Therefore, fewer recruits stand in the wings to replace them as baby boomers retire. As a result, healthcare has a serious staffing crisis.
Knowing the crisis was coming, researchers began exploring possible solutions to address the nation’s need for healthcare delivery. Their primary plan focused on shifting care to home, believing that most people preferred to recover at home. In addition, they felt that fewer complications occurred when patients recovered at home, and a home care delivery model significantly reduced medical costs. So they went about implementing the regulations to push early discharges and reduce long-term care facilities with a greater emphasis on in-home care. However, the one-piece they never planned well was how to prepare families for this additional burden.