Homestead Health now offers its NurseCaller technology to healthcare organizations, MCO’s, ACO’s, visiting nurse associations, and home health providers nationwide to help patients recover at home and reduce hospital readmissions.

NurseCaller is designed to increase patient communication and reduce avoidable and unnecessary hospital readmissions.

Via the NurseCaller, patients discharged from the hospital and recovering at home can call their visiting nurse, home health provider, or 24/7 nurse assist hotline directly for reasons such as asking questions about their medical condition(s), confirming medications, scheduling/rescheduling follow-up appointments, reporting a worsening condition, or requesting urgent nurse assistance.

“When patients are hospitalized, they rely upon the nurse call button to request immediate nurse assistance. Once they go home, however, that simple, familiar help caller is gone…until now,” states Kathleen Holohan, home health director with Homestead Health, in a media release.

Designed exclusively for home health providers, the NurseCaller is waterproof to 8 meters. It contains a GPS precision locator, real-time tracking for Alzheimer’s patients, and built-in optional fall alerts. In addition, it is user-programmable with any smartphone and includes optional geo-fencing for memory care patients.

Up to three nurse or home health agency numbers can be pre-programmed into the device. Additionally, a nurse can even call the patient’s NurseCaller directly in case the patient does not have a phone or has limited mobility.

In most cases, the NurseCaller can provide an early alert to a patient’s home health provider of health problems or developments before the patient involves an EMS dispatch and emergency department visit, the release continues.

“Studies are clearly showing that nurse/patient communication before, during, and following discharge must be an integral component to significantly reduce unnecessary readmissions,” Holohan adds. “Providing patients with a NurseCaller home health or visiting nurse call button can easily save tens of thousands of dollars for each and every avoidable admission—or readmission.”

[Source(s): Homestead Health, PR Newswire]