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Description
Heart failure is a chronic condition in which the heart cannot adequately provide blood and oxygen to tissues in the body. Heart failure patients account for the highest 30-day readmission rate in Medical-Surgical conditions (Nair et al., 2020). It is the leading cause of hospitalization in adults over 65 years old in the US. Constant readmission is costly, and therefore additional interventions must be done to prevent it. Due to the severity of heart failure, these patients require a copious amount of information at discharge to understand the pathophysiology of their disease, their medication regimen, and important lifestyle changes needed to prevent readmission. Without a standard of care, the amount of time nurses spend on discharge education and the comprehensiveness of the information provided may vary from provider to provider. In addition, a patient’s comprehension of the material is not always evaluated. Therefore, some patients are discharged without complete confidence about their self care regimen. Without this confidence, heart failure patients are less likely to adhere to their discharge protocol and ultimately have poorer health outcomes. Although previous research has been done on the effectiveness of patient education on the reduction of readmission rates among heart failure patients, there has been little research about the evaluation of education effectiveness and how to monitor discharge protocol adherence. The goal of this study is to consolidate a teaching method that accommodates one's existing educational barriers, implement follow-up to increase knowledge retention and improve self care, and to prevent readmission among heart failure patients.
Department
Nursing
Publication Date
2024
Sponsorship/Conference/Institution
Dominican University of California
City
San Rafael, CA
Keywords
heart failure, patient education, discharge education, readmission, rehospitalization
Disciplines
Cardiovascular Diseases | Critical Care Nursing | Geriatric Nursing | Nursing
Included in
Cardiovascular Diseases Commons, Critical Care Nursing Commons, Geriatric Nursing Commons