Ryan Phillips had a problem. In early 2021, Abbey Woods Center for Rehabilitation and Healing, the 100-bed skilled nursing facility in St. Joseph, Missouri, where Phillips served as administrator, was struggling with hospital readmissions. Far too many residents were getting sent out to the emergency department, and staffing challenges only made things worse.
“When I started at Abbey Woods, our readmission rate was way too high,” Phillips says. “We had months when almost half of our short-stay patients were getting sent back to the hospital, even though we had a local physician group on-call.”
The SNF’s solution came in May 2021, when they partnered with Sound Physicians and its TeleSNF program for tele-physician support on nights, weekends and holidays. Sound’s program, one of the fastest-growing LTPAC telemedicine solutions in the country, came through big for Phillips and Abbey Woods, cutting all-cause 30-day readmissions from an average of 32.4% to 4.5% — a reduction of 86%.
The results are cataloged in a new case study. Here is a look at how Abbey Woods succeeded.
The ability to treat patients in place
When a SNF works with Sound for tele-physician support, its nursing staff use iPads or tablets and cloud-based technology to connect with on-shift physicians who can see, assess and treat most conditions in place.
In fact, at over 150 TeleSNF programs nationwide, Sound treats patients in place 96% of the time. They can do this due to the engaged, on-shift hospitalist physicians who treat patients via video.
Prior to partnering with Sound Physicians, the staff at Abbey Woods faced the all-too-common nursing home challenge of on-call coverage after-hours, with no doctor in the building.
This standard practice — which often results in waking a physician in the middle of the night with a phone call — sends too many elderly and vulnerable SNF residents to the emergency department each year. At Abbey Woods, many basic interventions that could have been handled in-house, such as IVs for hydration, stat labs and fall assessments, resulted in an ambulance ride for the patient and a night in the ED. Sound now handles much of this.
For any SNF, treating more patients in place is a total game-changer, because unnecessary trips to the emergency room cause stress and expose residents to additional risks. Dr. Flavio Crisari, medical director for Ozanam Hall of Queens Nursing Home in Queens, New York, says the partnership with Sound Physicians has been an absolute win.
“When I reviewed last week’s telemedicine encounters, there were at least four clear examples where I know we would have sent the patients back to the hospital if the nurse had called a typical ‘after-hours’ doc on the phone,” Crisari says. “The Sound doctors write terrific notes, too.”
Helping administrators and DONs engage with night shift
Beyond the ability to treat patients in place, SNF administrators and directors of nursing gain another advantage from the program: improved engagement with the night shift, thanks to a daily encounter report. For Abbey Woods, the detailed reporting Sound Physicians provides each morning supports quality assurance.
“I cannot say enough about how valuable that automated email that I get every morning is for an administrator,” says Phillips. The encounter report is the first thing he looks at each morning, giving him a roadmap to understand the nursing department’s work and to help him, a non-clinical person, ask the right questions.
“This is all driving quality improvements,” he says. “The TeleSNF program gives me data I need to do my job as an executive.”
Significant reduction in hospital readmissions
In the end, the work with Sound has driven remarkable outcomes. Among them:
- Readmissions down 86%. Average all-cause 30-day readmissions dropped from 32.4% in the first half of 2021 to just 4.5% in the second half, an 86% reduction.
- 9 out of 10 patients treated in place. From July to December 2021, Sound’s tele-physicians treated 91 of the 101 patients they treated in place at Abbey Woods.
- Repeatable results. Sound’s TeleSNF program is delivering similar outcomes for their SNF partners across the country.
“We have actually seen our rehospitalization rate decreased to next to nothing,” Phillips says. “In fact, in September of 2021, our rehospitalization rate was zero. My recommendation to everyone in my position would be to give (Sound) a try, because you have nothing to lose and everything to gain from this program.”
This article is sponsored by Sound Physicians.To learn more about the advantages that Sound brings to SNFs, click here to read the complete Abbey Woods case study.
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