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Reducing readmissions is every hospital’s goal, but “There is a component of readmissions that has very little to do with hospital care,” said Amy Deutschendorf, MS, RN, vice president for care coordination and clinical resource management for the Johns Hopkins Health System.
She groups the common causes of readmissions into five categories: 1) poor care coordination, 2) problems with the quality of care during the first admission, 3) disease progression, 4) patients’ socioeconomic and sociodemographic issues, and 5) access to primary care. “Of those five reasons, the two that we could really do something about have to do with care coordination and ensuring that our patients are getting the appropriate care during the first admission,” said Ms. Deutschendorf.