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Quick Tip for Families in Intensive Care: My Loved One Not Getting the Proper Care and Attention in LTAC, Should He Have Stayed in ICU?

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

So, when you go to our website at intensivecarehotline.com, and you opt-in for your free instant impact report, we ask you, “What is your biggest frustration right now?” And we get a lot of insights.

A lot of my videos are driven by what people share with us what their frustration is. And yesterday, we had a frustration from a reader who says, “My biggest frustration is nursing, especially night nursing. My loved one is not getting the proper care and attention in LTAC.”

Now you have come here to intensivecarehotline.com and why do we talk about LTAC? Well, we talk about LTAC because a lot of patients in the U.S., very specific to the U.S. in ICU often with the tracheostomy, sometimes with a PEG (Percutaneous Endoscopic Gastrostomy) tube, sometimes without a PEG tube and a nasogastric tube, and ICUs are trying to push them to LTAC. LTAC stands for long term acute care but it might sound fancy. It’s not even the better version of a nursing home, patients going from ICU to more or less to a nursing home that is not safe. It’s not in the best interest of a patient, but it is often in the best interest of a hospital and the ICU because they can save money, they can free up beds. It’s really not about the patient or the family here at all.

So therefore, I’m not surprised that your biggest frustration is that your loved one is not getting the proper care and nursing care in LTAC because imagine this, if your loved one has a tracheostomy and a PEG, they’re going from ICU with ICU nurses, ICU doctors, respiratory therapists, to an LTAC which is not even the better version of a nursing home. And of course, you would be frustrated. No question about that and no doubt about that. So how to avoid it?

And again, I’ve done numerous videos about this, “Why you shouldn’t go to LTAC?”, you can use our search function on our website intensivecarehotline.com, type in “LTAC, why not to go there?” You’ll get articles and videos about the subject and I’m not going into too much detail here because it’s been covered before.

In the meantime, how can you avoid going to LTAC?.  So you can avoid sharing this frustration with me because it’s much easier managing the situation while your loved one is in intensive care, much easier.

So, we have helped countless and we are helping countless families in intensive care to keep their loved ones where they should be, which is in intensive care as long as they’re critically ill. So they’re not getting moved to LTAC, which again is not designed for clinical need. It’s designed for saving money and freeing up ICU beds. And patients and families suffer because of it.

So we have helped countless families with our proven strategies, with our consulting and advocacy, by keeping patients there over and over again. So that your loved one can get best care and treatment while they are in intensive care.

And more importantly, you need to be in a position to make informed decisions, get peace of mind, control, power and influence when you have a loved one in intensive care.

So, therefore, we actually have a membership for families of critically ill patients in intensive care where you can get help. And you can get access to our membership for families of critically ill patients in intensive care where we answer all questions intensive care related.

When you go to intensivecarehotline.com, you click on the membership link or you go to intensivecaresupport.org directly. In the membership you have access to me and my team 24 hours a day in the membership area and via email. We answer all questions intensive care related, including how to keep your loved one in ICU for as long as it’s clinically necessary. So they’re not going to LTAC which once again is not even the better version of a nursing home in the membership area. You have access to me and my team 24 hours a day. And again, we answer all questions, intensive care related.

I also offer one one-on-one consulting and advocacy for families in intensive care over the phone, via Skype, Zoom, WhatsApp, whichever medium works best for you. And I talk to doctors and nurses directly and I ask all the questions you haven’t even considered asking but must be asked so that you make informed decisions, have peace of mind, control, power, and influence fast.

I also represent you in family meetings with intensive care teams so that you don’t get walked all over. If you’ve been to a family meeting with intensive care teams without clinical representation and without knowing what questions to ask, without knowing what to look for, without knowing your rights, without knowing how to manage doctors and nurses in intensive care, you know what I’m talking about and you know why it’s necessary to have me there and ask all the questions you haven’t even considered asking, but must be asked and then the intensive care team knows you have someone on your team that understands intensive care as well as they do.

We also offer medical record reviews  in real time so that you can get a second opinion in real time. Again, so that you can make informed decisions, have peace of mind, control, power and influence. We also offer medical record reviews after intensive care if you have unanswered questions, if you need closure or if you’re simply suspecting medical negligence, but you will be in a much, much better position if you get help in real time and not wait until your loved one is no longer in intensive care. If they make it that far because you didn’t get help, potentially all of that you get at the intensivecarehotline.com. Call us on one of the numbers on the top of our website or send us an email to [email protected].

Now, if you like my videos, subscribe to my YouTube channel for regular updates for families in intensive care. Click the like button, click the notification bell, share the video with your friends and families. Comment below what you want to see next, or what questions and insights you have from this video.

Thanks for watching.

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

Take care for now.