Author: IPRO

This tool is designed to help post-acute and long-term care (PALTC) facilities collect data on medication discrepancies found upon admission for residents/patients discharged from the hospital to the PALTC.

Safer Medication Management for Better Transition of Care
SHM recognizes the importance of equipping hospital clinicians with evidence-based strategies to prescribe, document, and reconcile medications accurately and safely at times of care transitions.

Medication reconciliation, or med rec, is the process of compiling the most accurate list of medications a patient is taking to avoid dosing or other errors.

Take responsibility for med rec with your patients by:

Leading, coordinating or participating in med rec quality improvement efforts that incorporate best practices to improve patient outcomes.
Grasping key evidence-based interventions, such as obtaining the best possible medication history and effective discharge medication counseling.
Identifying patients who are at high risk for medication discrepancies due to the number and/or types of medications they are prescribed

This document is intended for use as a guide for nurse-to-nurse verbal communication of medication-related information required for safe patient transfer upon discharge from the sending to receiving facility.

The Plain Language Action and Information Network offers a variety of introductory classes on plain language. Plain language makes it easier for the public to read, understand, and use government and other communications. You may use their materials for self-study or to create your own class. The website includes videos, online training, train-the-trainer boot camp and tips for starting a plain language program.

Read about Medstar Washington Hospital Center’s intervention to address food insecurity as part of its Community Health Program, including helping employees who are food insecure.

This 1-hour online course is designed to provide education for health care providers and staff who are responsible for collecting Medicare patient data from LGBTQ persons. Throughout this course, these providers will be called health care providers. (Requires free registration with MLN)

Monthly newsletters with the latest health equity news, events, and tools to support your efforts in eliminating health care disparities within your health system and communities.

This Learning Toolbox focuses on cultural and linguistic competency and their importance for helping to eliminate disparities in the delivery of quality healthcare.  The Toolbox includes a quick primer, and provides useful links to articles, tools, and resources.

This Learning Toolbox focuses on health literacy as an important determinant of health equity and outcomes. It includes a quick primer on health literacy, and provides links to articles, tools, and resources to improve the health literacy of organizations and patients.

This infographic describes the journey that social determinants of health (SDOH) data takes from the individual through the health system to data reporting as ICD-10-CM Z codes. It discusses data collection, documentation, coding and reporting. It contains resources to help implement programs to collect and report SDOH data in a manner that can lead to better health outcomes for individuals.

Prior to COVID-19, health care investments in SDOH programs to support connecting patients to community resources were on the rise, supported by a proliferation of technology solutions like Aunt Bertha, Unite Us, NowPow and others. These resource databases serve as critical tools for tracking the local services landscape and connecting people to the essential resources they need to be healthy (Cartier et al. 2019). However, when adopting these technology solutions to support SDOH programs, it is important to recognize that more resource information does not always result in people being connected to resources. There are best practices for managing resource information, and using and interpreting the data to effectively and equitably connect people to resources. Here, we aim to provide examples to demonstrate the ways in which data usage and interpretation can impact equitable access to essential resources and improve connection rates.

This report updates the 2017 data highlight on Z code claims for Medicare fee-for-service (FFS) beneficiaries. Using social determinants of health (SDOH) Z codes can enhance quality improvement activities, track factors that influence people’s health, and provide further insight into existing health inequities. The report describes Z code claim data collected from 2016-2019 and highlights potential strategies to increase Z code utilization in reducing health care disparities.

Technology solutions connecting health and social care services. (Acquired NowPow and Carrot Health in 2021).

Aunt Bertha’s network connects people seeking help with social needs and Search and connect to support. Financial assistance, food pantries, medical care, and other free or reduced-cost help starts here at FindHelp.