Elizabeth A Madigan

..e., area variation) factors related to 30-day rehospitalization in a national population of HHC patients with HF, and to describe the extent to which rehospitalizations were potentially avoidable...

..Promoting functional capacity is an important priority particularly in HHC. The purpose of the study was to examine predictors of functional capacity change among HHC patients with HF...

..However, I am concerned that home healthcare nurses are not ready for the extent of these drastic changes, and I present several scenarios that could occur, based on the IOM report and existing research...

..The findings also raise questions regarding the appropriateness of these adverse events and whether there are additional adverse events that warrant monitoring and follow-up evaluation...

..Patients with heart failure represent a common patient population in home health care, yet little is known about their outcomes...

..Examination of both unadjusted and adjusted numbers of providers is important to understand community-based EOL provider supply...

..In particular, discharge destination and length of stay have not been studied using a data mining approach which may provide insights not obtained through traditional statistical analyses...

..36 and .26. OASIS ADLs and cognitive status items are sufficiently valid, but the OASIS depression item is not sufficiently sensitive to the prevalence of these conditions...

..4-16%), with fewer visits (15.5 vs. 9.5) and equal clinical outcomes and patient satisfaction. There were no significant differences in outcomes for patients with diabetes...

..The ADL change index score provided the most comprehensive analysis of functional status change although the categorical scores are useful for simple approaches...

..Continued monitoring of OASIS data collection accuracy is recommended to maximize the value of the OASIS instrument in home health care research, practice, and policy...

..No significant relationship was found between RN characteristics of education, RN experience, home healthcare experience, and specialty certification...

..To describe the incidence and duration of breastfeeding for mothers of twins and identify factors that affected this duration...

..The authors focus on factors affecting OASIS accuracy within the agency and strategies to evaluate and improve OASIS accuracy...

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..60. We conclude that OASIS item interrater reliability was highly adequate in this study, but we recommend routine interrater-reliability evaluation by agencies to maximize the quality of OASIS data nationally...

..The overall costs were reduced on average by more than $13,000 per patient...

..Nurses' bags--a ubiquitous fomite in the home health care environment--may serve as a potential reservoir for multidrug-resistant organisms...

..These areas are consistent with the regulatory events in home health care in the last 10 years...

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..Another finding from this study suggested that none of the identified predisposing, enabling, and health-status factors found in this study could plausibly explain knowledge of need for, or use of community-specific services...

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..Rurality may not have a direct effect on outcomes but instead acts through health care services...

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..This study begins to provide evidence that differences exist between urban and rural areas and between practice settings...

..When categorizing states by rurality, the choice of the measure used influences which states are identified as most rural. We demonstrate this premise in a study of rural home healthcare...