The California HealthCare Foundation (CHCF) is determined to improve hospital health care in order to "ensure that all Californians can get the care they need, when they need it, at a price they can afford."

With the new emphasis on improving hospital care, hospital medicine has become the fastest-growing specialty in health care today. Specialists in hospital medicine are known as "hospitalists" and more than 31,000 are already on the job.

In the last decade, studies have indicated that these hospitalists can decrease the time you have to stay in the hospital, increase your satisfaction with your hospital care, reduce the chance you'll have to be readmitted and lower hospital costs.

Better Hospital Care Means That Fewer Patients Have To Be Readmitted

Currently in California, more than one-third of the patients released from the hospital find themselves right back in the hospital within a year. That high rate of readmission has produced a statewide initiative to reduce the need for hospital readmissions.

Known as Project BOOST, which stands for Better Outcomes for Older adults through Safe Transitions, the program focuses on identifying patients with an increased risk for readmission. In addition to trying to reduce readmissions within the first 30 days after patients are released, Project BOOST also works to increase patient satisfaction and improve the information exchange between hospital staff and outpatient doctors.

Twenty Californian Hospitals Are Purchasing Training To Reduce Patient Readmissions

Thanks to funding from the CHCF, 20 hospitals in California are scheduled to receive Project BOOST training, which will be provided by the Society of Hospital Medicine that developed Project BOOST in 2008. While CHCF will help with technical assistance costs, each of the 20 hospitals will pay $14,500 for the training. That makes it more likely that they'll try to get their money's worth by putting the training to good use.

"Project BOOST provides education, tools, and mentoring for hospital physicians to link their patient's care with community physicians," says the senior program officer of CHCF's Better Chronic Disease Care Program. As an R.N., Kat O'Malley sees the need for this because, "While physicians who specialize in hospital medicine may provide excellent care to their patients in the hospital, too many fall through the cracks after discharge."

As the California BOOST leader, Janet Nagamine, R.N., M.D., S.F.H.M., explains that, "Reducing readmissions requires intense attention to detail, strong communication skills, patience, and a systemic, team-based approach - all of which Project BOOST can help instill."

The BOOST program begins by improving discharge procedures with one-on-one mentorships with leaders in the field during the first year of the hospital staff's training. To spread the training farther and faster, the second year of the BOOST program builds a sustainable infrastructure by training more Californian mentors.

Improvements In Hospital Care Increase The Value Of Health Insurance In California

What if you could get well faster in the hospital and return home without needing further hospital care? That's exactly what 20 hospitals plan to accomplish with the BOOST program. Hospital readmissions not only cause patients unnecessary stress, but also expose patients to higher medical bills. Improving hospital care quality, perfecting discharge procedures and enhancing communication between hospital physicians and community doctors have been shown to protect patients from the need to return to the hospital.

Reducing the risk for readmission can also save California residents the out-of-pocket expenses they have to pay, such as meeting a deductible, before California health insurance covers their hospital bills.

Hospital readmissions are expensive to the patients, their families, their employers and, ultimately, the general public. A study published in the New England Journal of Medicine in 2009 reported that readmissions alone cost Medicare $17.4 billion a year.

Improved care while you're in the hospital and once you are discharged, shorter hospital stays and lower out-of-pocket costs can enhance both hospital care and the health insurance in California that makes it affordable. This new approach stands to produce better outcomes for patients and for the future of health care in the U.S.