The University at Buffalo (N.Y.) School of Nursing has been awarded a two-year, $298,934 grant by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality to create a pilot project for ensuring that patients get follow-up care at primary physician offices soon after hospital discharge.
According to Sharon Hewner, assistant professor of nursing and author of the grant, there has been a lack of timely communication between the hospital and community setting. "Our project will use the electronic health record to exchange health information across settings in real time," she said, "and provide decision support to nurse care coordinators in primary care offices to proactively prevent re-hospitalization."
The study will also identify ways to implement a system of two-way communication that alerts the primary care clinic immediately about their patient's hospital discharge and transmits the results back to the hospital and other providers.
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