Taking health Care to a Higher Level
September 5, 2010
By Union-Tribune Editorial Board
San Diego Hospice and the Institute for Palliative Medicine contact: Melissa DelaCalzada, San Diego Hospice, 619-517-2053 cell; mdelacalzada@sdhospice.org [1]
When something is the gold standard, you want to make it available to as many people as possible.
That’s the concept behind two recent developments in the region’s medical care, and the public is the better for it.
Rady Children’s Hospital is the gold standard for pediatric and neonatal intensive care in our county – so much so that parents will drive 40 miles, past a hospital with empty pediatric beds, to take their child to Rady Children’s. Specialists from other institutions want to follow the patients and tend to relocate.
Rady Children’s, now at 261 beds and with an acute care pavilion opening Oct. 10, is expanding its facilities. But it is expanding its reach as well, opening various outpatient facilities and partnerships in North County and neighboring Riverside County.
The latest move came last month with Rady Children’s taking over 17 pediatric and 12 neonatal intensive care beds at Palomar Medical Center in Escondido. Palomar’s staff is retained, but the operator and protocols now are Rady Children’s. The emphasis at Palomar, as with other satellite locations, will be on health conditions that do not require considerable follow-up care from specialists. Those patients will be sent directly to Rady Children’s at Clairemont Mesa.
The trend is a win/win for all concerned. Parents won’t have to drive miles beyond a convenient hospital. Palomar expects to see full beds, not empty ones, and has avoided having to close a unit because it is not financially viable.
“We bring some of our expertise into their hospital,” said Rady Chief Operating Officer Meg Norton, “but patients also benefit from the services Palomar provides.” Gerald Bracht, Palomar’s chief administrative officer, put it this way: “It is an opportunity to keep families in the community in which they live. We hope that more of the Rady expertise will be brought to bear.”
Meantime, the gold standard label for end-of-life treatment in the region belongs to San Diego Hospice and the Institute for Palliative Medicine [2].
So a second encouraging collaboration is that senior educators from the institute will be doing guest lectures this fall to nursing students at California State University [3] , San Marcos; National University; and Southwestern Community College.
The lecture series means that thirty-something nursing students, often already exposed to elder care through internships, will learn theory directly from experts. School faculties will later integrate the teachings into their hands-on instruction.
“In terminal care,” said Cathy McJannet, Southwestern’s director of nursing and health occupations, “the patient and the family come as one unit. You must also tend to the family’s needs.”
Health care, as anyone who has seen a hospital bill lately, knows, is pricey. It’s reassuring to know the price comes with moves to stretch the gold standard, to take care to a higher level.
This article is displayed from The San Diego Union Tribune: please click here [4] to view the article in the Union Tribune Web site.
About San Diego Hospice and The Institute for Palliative Medicine
San Diego Hospice and The Institute for Palliative Medicine (www.sdhospice.org [2]), the leader in the relief of suffering, is one of the 10 largest community-owned, not-for-profit hospices in the country, with one of the largest resources in the world for training palliative medicine physicians and other specialists. The organization brings compassionate, expert medical care to more than 1,000 seriously ill adults and children each day throughout San Diego and North County. More information is available online at www.sdhospice.org [2] or call toll-free at 1-866-688-1600.
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