Healthy Collaboration
Students coach discharged patients to improve health and reduce hospital readmissions
Wednesday, November 19, 2014
Southeastern's College of Nursing and Health Sciences recently launched a program with North Oaks Health System in Hammond to reduce the number of patient readmissions to the hospital. As part of the program, Southeastern students and local health care professionals are being trained to provide follow-up consultation with patients after they are discharged.
"This internship has offered a wide variety of experience. We have had the opportunity to view health care from the perspective of a nurse, a social worker, a health coach and a patient both in the hospital setting and in the patient's home," said Bobijo Bode, a health education and promotion senior.
According to Dr. Ralph Wood, professor of health education and promotion, Southeastern is the only university in Louisiana providing this level of training to undergraduate students.
The Health Transition Alliance program trains the health coaches to work with diagnoses of heart attack, chronic obstructive lung disease, congestive heart failure and pneumonia. The program is funded by a three-year $351,989 grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
Southeastern students, as well as local health care workers, are gaining valuable experience through the Health Transition Alliance program at North Oaks Health System.
Under the guidance of Dr. Wood, Southeastern students enrolled in HS 410: Internship in Health Education and Promotion are participating in the health coach opportunity this fall. Students enrolled in both HS 410: Internship in Health Education and Promotion and KIN 410: Internship in Exercise Science, Fitness, or Sports Management in the spring 2015 semester will have the opportunity to participate in the program.
The students and other health coaches ensure discharged patients are following their physicians' instructions for home care, including taking medications, following a prescribed diet, using appropriate therapies and scheduling follow-up visits with their physicians. The majority of the patients have been receiving personalized health coaching in their own homes.
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid estimate readmissions cost an estimated $17 billion annually. The health coaching program is being studied by local economic development organizations to show how it could save millions in lost revenue, as well as create future employment positions in the field of health coaching.
