Southwest General Health Center Part 1

           Southwest General Health Center, located in Middleburg Heights,  is where I have been for the past six weeks for Capstone. Southwest is a community hospital that has around 300 beds. It is very interesting being at a smaller health center, because I am so used to having clinicals and other experiences at UH and the Cleveland Clinic. The hospital here is like a breath of fresh air, everyone knows one another and is willing to do whatever it takes to help each other out. Brandon and I spend most of our time in an office with the community nurses. The unique thing about Southwest is that they have a whole staff fully committed to the programs put on by the community department. Many of the nurses alternate between doing screenings/information sessions around the community and the Transition Nursing Program.
          The Transition Nursing Program is a program that was recently implemented last May. There was a lot of reasons why this program was created. Starting this October, Medicare began penalizing hospitals if congestive heart failure patients were readmitted before 30 days post discharge. The transition nurses at SWGHC identify patients with heart failure while they are in the hospital, and ask them if they would like to be involved in the transition program. This entails a home visit three days after the patient is discharged. During this visit, the nurses go over the patient's medications, and teach them all about their disease so they know when they need to call/visit their physician. After all questions are answered, the nurse leaves the patient with a scale so they can keep track of any weight gain or loss. For the next 30 days, the patient is called on a weekly basis to check in and make sure everything is going well. These interventions by the nurse helps ensure that the patients are not readmitted to the hospital, and therefore, the hospital benefits by not receiving any financial consequences. This is what our capstone project will be focusing on, and we are very happy with the results we have found so far!
        The amazing thing about the community department at SW is the amount of programs that have been created. Other than the transition nursing program, Southwest has a program for school nurses, a Neighborhood Care Free Clinic, and offers bone density, glucose, cholesterol, and BMI screenings free of charge at local organizations. There are several program for the geriatric population, for much of the surrounding area is elderly. A geriatric assessment program and Gatekeeper program benefit this population greatly. The Gatekeeper program identifies at risk geriatric patients that may need help in the community with activities of daily living, and training programs are scheduled for community members so they know just exactly what they should be looking for. All of the ladies that run these programs are wonderful.
        Brandon and I have been lucky enough to be involved in not only the Transition Nursing Program, but all of the programs that I just mentioned as well. Going out into the community allows me to come in contact with older adults, which I have missed since working in pediatrics for the last year. The community department has been extremely helpful with setting up visits and involving us with their different events, and they are very excited to see our final poster and project!