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Hi, it’s Patrik Hutzel from intensivecarehotline.com with another quick tip for families in intensive care.

So, today’s tip is for our U.S. audience mainly. And I have this email from Sally, and Sally says, “LTAC is making us move my husband to a nursing home today. And I appealed and was denied the appeal in less than 24 hours. What should I do?”

Now, I need to give you some context here. For those of you that don’t know what LTAC means, LTAC stands for Long-Term Acute Care facility. And again, this is a U.S.-specific topic today where many patients in ICU, after they have a tracheostomy and they can’t be weaned off the ventilator, are often sent to LTAC (Long-Term Acute Care) facility.

Now, if you’ve watched any of my videos for any length of time, or if you’ve watched or you are reading my blog, you would’ve seen many case studies where we strictly and strongly advise against LTAC . It’s a disaster area.

It’s insanity sending someone from ICU to LTAC. And then when patients in LTAC don’t get better, and they often don’t, because LTACs are simply not designed to look after ventilated patients with tracheostomy, then it’s getting worse. It’s going from bad to worse. Then, they want to send people to a nursing home on a ventilator and a tracheostomy.

The reality is that the only place you can safely look after ventilation and tracheostomy is actually ICU because you need ICU doctors, ICU nurses. In America, in the U.S., you need respiratory therapists to make that happen. And those resources are simply not there in LTAC, let alone in a nursing home. It’s insanity. And we have literally people begging us all day long, similar to the email from Sally here, to get them out of LTAC.

Another option for those patients is Intensive Care at Home. So rather than going from intensive care to LTAC, you should check out Intensive Care at Home. Go to intensivecareathome.com as a genuine alternative to a long-term stay in intensive care.

But Sally, in your situation, what you should have done in the first place is, you should have never agreed to go to LTAC in the first place. We have helped countless families in intensive care in the U.S. to stay in ICU and not go to LTAC through our professional consulting and advocacy. How can that happen?

Well, we break down the clinical scenarios for you. We can help you advocate on a clinical end, and on a family level because we understand intensive care inside out.

I’ve worked in intensive care for over 20 years in three different countries. And I have worked as a nurse unit manager in intensive care for over 5 years. So, you got to understand intensive care inside out. You got to almost provide a second opinion to clients, and you have to provide the clinical insights.

The biggest challenge for families in intensive care is that they don’t know what they don’t know. They don’t know what to look for. They don’t know what questions to ask. They don’t know their rights and they don’t know how to manage doctors and nurses in intensive care.

And, many ICUs in the U.S. use almost guerilla tactics. They say, “We’re doing a tracheostomy tomorrow” and they wouldn’t tell you what’s next because next is often going to LTAC. And they won’t tell you about it unless you’re asking the right questions. If you’re coming to us and you’re telling us, “Hey, my loved one’s going to have a tracheostomy tomorrow. What should we do?” Well, the first question that I have for you is, “Well, have they told you about LTAC?” And nine times out of ten, they haven’t.

So, ICUs are not putting on their cards on the table. It’s such a highly complex and specialized environment. You need to anticipate the next moves and you can only do that if you have someone with you that can anticipate the next moves of the ICU team. It’s almost like a game of chess and you need to know how to play it.  And we can help you with all of that.

So, if you have a loved one in ICU, go to intensivecarehotline.com. Call us on one of the numbers on the top of the website, or simply send us an email to [email protected].

Also, have a look at our membership for families in intensive care at intensivecaresupport.org.

If you want a medical record review for your critically ill loved one while they’re in ICU, click on the link below this video.

Also, if you like this video, give it a thumbs up, subscribe to my YouTube channel for updates for families in intensive care, click the notification bell, and leave your comments below what you want to see next, or what questions and insights you have from this video.

This is Patrik Hutzel from intensivecarehotline.com and I will talk to you in a few days.