Today in Health IT, we are discussing empowering family caregivers, key to enhancing hospice patient outcomes.

My name is Sarah Richardson, and I'm a former CIO for several healthcare systems, most notably with NHC and Optum, and now president of the This Week Health 229 Executive Development Community, where we host a set of Channels and events dedicated to transforming healthcare, one connection at a time. And I am joined by Kate Gamble, Managing Editor here at This Week Health.

Kate, welcome to the show. Thank you, Sarah. Happy to be here. Always love hanging out with you and talking about the news, mostly because we dig into all kinds of different topics. And I love this one specifically about empowering family caregivers, which is the key to enhancing hospice patient outcomes.

Family caregivers are essential in hospice care. They significantly influence patient outcomes and family wellbeing with about 53 million caregivers in the U S. Their lack of support can adversely affect not only patients, but also healthcare organizations like hospices that depend on caregiver engagement.

What I found super interesting is that challenges such as financial limitations, staffing shortages, and insufficient incentives for innovation further complicate this situation. Kate, as you were reading this as well, what came to mind for you? So we are seeing more emphasis on this in the past few years, particularly As the people we speak with have experience being a caregiver for a parent or family member, I know of several CXOs, as I'm sure who have relocated or changed jobs to provide that type of care.

And I think it's prompted a lot of thinking about how to make this easier and how to improve outcomes. And the data show that caregivers who are given proper care support can provide better care, which not only benefits the patient and family, but also the healthcare organization, because you're seeing those improved outcomes.

So obviously this is just really important topic and there's a lot to break down here. There's so much because improving caregiver support is vital. We know that empowered caregivers are better equipped to address their loved ones needs, which leads to more positive patient experiences and outcomes.

And a comprehensive approach to bolstering caregiver resources is necessary to enhance the overall healthcare continuum. What I found most interesting too is that 53 million people is about 16 percent of the U. S. population in a caregiver role. And that impact on hospice providers, if they receive poor ratings for Medicaid, if they fail to adequately support families and caregivers can affect their ability to attract and support future patients.

And then also when you support the caregiver themselves, they provide better care and across the board, higher satisfaction, better outcomes that really can also influence quality ratings. From the CIO perspective, Tell me a little bit about some of the relevance in what we can do from a technology perspective.

Yeah. And I'm glad you put it that way because I feel like sometimes this gets put on nursing leaders and this is not just on nursing leaders at all. There's a lot of components to it. So we're looking at CIOs and other C suite leaders, There's a couple different things. One is, as we talked a little bit about, enhancing patient outcomes. So integrating family caregivers into care plans can lead to better outcomes and align with organizational goals for quality care. And then we're also looking at Improved satisfaction metrics supporting caregivers contributes to higher satisfaction scores, which are crucial, as we've said, for reimbursement and reputation.

And of course, technology plays a role in this. Digital tools can facilitate communication and support for caregivers, improving their ability to care for patients effectively. And when anytime you mentioned technology, there's a whole lot that goes into that, but that's just one component of this.

This is such an important topic. And we also have to think about proper training and resources, making sure that caregivers have that which can reduce their stress and let them provide better care. And of course, we can't forget the importance of policies and making sure that there are policies in place that recognize and support the role of caregivers. Yeah, they can enhance that by integrating into the healthcare continuum overall. Here's what I was thinking about, resource allocation.

When you can invest in programs and technologies that support caregivers, it may require reallocation of resources, but it also leads to some significant long term benefits. There's the aspect of collaboration, where encouraging collaboration between healthcare providers and caregivers can improve care coordination and patient outcomes.

And then a big one is recognition. Acknowledging the contributions of caregivers that can foster a more inclusive and supportive healthcare environment. When we value and support family caregivers, healthcare organizations can enhance the patient care, have better metrics. Have a more collaborative care environment.

More than anything, build that rapport and that trust because hospice can occur at any point in someone's life. We often think about it in terms of end of life care, and yet it's so much more nuanced than that. And having truly experienced it, I had to take care of a terminally ill parent. Hospice was truly that point of reference where if you had a question, they came by regularly, able to coordinate.

Equipment being brought by the house, help with prescriptions, help with so many different aspects. The thing about hospice care, it's almost one of those things that you need to know about before you need to use it, and it's not like when you're in a perfectly healthy scenario and working through your day to day life, you're going to reach out and figure out how hospice and hospice care works, especially through insurance and different avenues, such As that inclusive of the physician and the hospital.

However, you never know when you might need it. And it could be for short term or longer term. It's one of those things I encourage anyone who's listening, anyone who follows these types of stories, really think about it and what that can mean for you and your family. It is there as a support mechanism.

And yet there are a lot of nuances to it, especially per state that are important to realize and understand. And the one I'll focus on the most. is that role of the family caregiver in helping them to also have time for themselves to step away from the care they're providing because they too can become very isolated in an environment where they're tasked with doing what is best for their family.

Yeah. Thanks for sharing that. It's really valuable to hear from people who have gone through it. And, like we said, this is affecting so many people and there's so much to this, so it's really important to keep an eye on this and think about the different ways that we can enhance, not just patient outcomes but also just make it easier for the caregivers and give them the resources that they need.

Yes, and I'll say as well as when you think about the ability to communicate effectively with family members. And so whether you're doing that within the patient portal or other aspects of patient engagement tools with your patients, as an example, having the hospice care be an element of that is tremendous.

And so you could ask the questions, you can find the information, you can connect to the right people to get the things that you need. So hospice should be an element of the patient engagement. Platforms that are being utilized by healthcare providers for CIOs, CISOs, etc. Having that layer of security, having that layer of interoperability and integration of the different components of the journey for the patient and the family, those things coming together, hospice should be an element of that conversation.

And we're seeing here that it absolutely has

The right traction.

And it also has the ability to enhance outcomes across the continuum. So I am hopeful that for anyone listening to this that you don't have to utilize these services anytime soon. But if you are one of the 53 million people who do reach out for hospice care you know that there are resources available

to

you and ways to integrate it into your overall journey.

Well said. It comes down to that basic premise, you have

to care

for the caregivers. You have to care for the caregivers. Exactly. Share this podcast with a friend or a colleague. Use it as a foundation for daily or weekly discussions on the topics that are relevant to you and the industry. You can subscribe wherever you 📍 listen to podcasts.

Kate, thank you for joining me on this show today. Thank you. Thanks for listening. That's all for now.