How Can An iPod Reduce Hospital Readmissions?

The Cullman Regional Medical Center in Alabama is using handy technology to reduce readmissions by recording discharge instructions, as well as videos, pictures and documents on iPods which they give to patients or their caregivers. Nurses use a program called "Good to Go" which allows patients, families and other care givers  to review the discharge instructions and other important information related to a patient's care whenever they need to.

The Medical Center is beta-testing the program, but so far is reporting great success. They have seen a 15 percent decrease in 30-day readmissions.

Read more about this initiative here.

An INQRI-funded study on discharge teaching and patients' readiness conducted by Marianne Weiss and Olga Yakusheva found that the quality of nurses' discharge teaching is affected by RN hours per patient day, overtime hours and vacancies. They also found that higher quality discharge teaching was correlated with patients reporting a higher level of readiness to be discharged, lower readmission rates, and fewer emergency room visits.