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Hello. I'm Dr. Shealyn Buck of Decatur, Georgia.
I'll be taking you on a tour of DeKalb Medical's LTAC and introducing you to
members of it's excellent care team.
You may be searching for a facility like this for
your loved one is being discharged regular hospital
or acute care facility but still requires specialized recovery care.
Decatur is on the central eastern side Atlanta
and is one of the metro area's most charming places to live,
work and visit. The LTAC here on Candler Street is near Commerce Drive and is within
walking distance of the Decatur MARTA station.
You have choices when selecting a long-term
acute care facility for your loved one and we believe this hospital is
exceptional
because of it's compassionate care, excellent patient results
and it's great location. Our tour starts on the main floor where patients and
families first go to be admitted.
We'll meet Trish Burns, a respiratory therapist here who will help explain
just what an LTAC or or long-term acute care facility
is. Hey Dr. Buck. I am Trish from respiratory therapy.Nice to meet you!
So Trish, what is an LTAC exactly?
An LTAC is a specialized hospital.
Most of our patients come from another hospital setting where they may
have been in intensive care unit or on the floors.
They need continued care and specialized care, and they come to us.
What types a specialized programs do you offer here?
We've got a lot of programs we're really proud of.
Two specifically are our disease-specific ventilator weaning program
and our disease-specific wound care program. We treat wounds and
we wean patients from the ventilator. Is this like a nursing home
or an assisted living facility? No, I don't want you to think this is a nurse home.
It is a long term acute care hospital. Our length of stay here is typically 20
to 30 days.
We do what we do best then our patients can either go home
or to another level of care.
Moving a loved one to an LTAC can be a difficult time in a family's life,
and that's why DeKalb Medical has pleasantly designed this hospital
to make it welcoming for families and patients needing long stays.
Let's meet with Referral Services Director Wylonda Jones
to talk about how the admissions process works.
Hi! Hi Wylonda. Do you mind if I have a seat?
No, have a seat. One of the
common questions that people have is "How does a patient get a referral here?"
The admission process begins with the referral from the patient's
physician. The referral can be electronically sent to us,
it can be faxed or a telephone call can be made to
our admissions coordinator. We have a very simple
registration process here. We are prepared
upon your arrival with our process of getting the paperwork completed.
It will be pre-printed and waiting for you. In addition to that,
our waiting room is very nice and we have free beverages
for you and your family. We also have a very compassionate staff...
a great team of individuals who are here to assist you upon your arrival.
Does that include help with insurance? Absolutely!
We will sit down and go over your love one's treatment plan
for the length of stay that you're going to be here in our facility. That's got to be a
big relief.
And what about the location? Our location in downtown Decatur
offers families lots a choices.
They can walk to restaurants, grocery stores, coffee shops,
churches and a great library. We also have a really good cafeteria here on our
ground floor offering healthy foods
at a low cost.
The location also has a spacious parking lot and offers free parking for admitted
patient families,
which is a nice benefit. A smooth admission's process, this
ideal location and its distinguished amenities are great reasons to ask your
physician for referral to DeKalb Medical's LTAC.
An even more important reason is the excellent medical care practiced
here
that includes a customized approach for each patient and begins before they even
arrive.
Let's hear more from one of the physicians, Dr. Terri TenHoor.
Doctor, how does the team here transition the patient from their previous facility?
We have a case management team that goes to the previous facility
and takes a look at the patient, their history, all of their problems
and basically makes a chart. They then review that with whoever the medical director is
or the attending physician
for appropriateness of admission. How does the team coordinate the patient's care
once they're here?
When the patient arrives in our facility they are initially met by the physician and
nursing team.
Shortly thereafter a team of physical therapists,
respiratory therapists, occupational therapists and speech therapists will
all assess the patient.
Within 48 hours the entire care team with their various plans sit down with
the family members
to detail the patient's plan of care and therapy.
What other physician specialists might provide care for a patient here?
We have an excellent team of support physicians
including infectious disease. Many of our patients
have wound care or antibiotic issues, so we partner with infectious disease
specialty team.
We also have pulmonary and critical care. We have neurology.
We have neuropsychiatry and even surgeons and plastic surgeons that will
come help us with our patients.
As you search for long-term acute care for your loved one
it's important to compare the specialties offered at each facility.
DeKalb Medical is one of the only LTACs to have a comprehensive team of
specialists on staff.
These specialists manage everything from intravenous antibiotics therapy
to customized nutritional care, wound care,
ventilator weaning and even an on-site pharmacy
located on the main floor.
Another point of pride here is the rehabilitation therapy
that can help patients progress toward greater mobility and strength,
even if they are on a ventilator. Lockwood Murphy,
one of the specially-trained physical therapists here, is waiting for us
in the third floor gym.
Hi Lockwood. Hi Dr. Buck, how are you doing?
You're one of the licensed physical therapists here
in the rehab gym. Can you tell us a little bit about what types of programs, what
types of activities that you do with patients?
Yeah, well down here in the gym we do a lot of things. We have parallel bars where
we can work on walking. We have a mat over there where we can work on
just transferring from a wheelchair onto the mat.
On the mat we can work on rolling and other activities that patients would do
in bed.
So patients who are on a ventilator...
can they still do rehab activities? Here we are Joint Commission Gold Seal
Certified.
We can take them off the ventilators and hook them up to portable oxygen
tanks and we can bring them down here.
We can bring all the equipment we need to bring to monitor their vital signs
and make sure that they're safe.
We do everything we would do with a patient who is not on a ventilator.
In addition to the therapy gym, the third floor houses
other clinical services that many LTACs don't have on-site.
Minor surgical procedures like tracheotomy or tube removal
are taking care of in the procedure room.
Patients needing X-rays or other imaging during their stay
will come to the radiology room.
Now we'll move to the fifth floor to take a look at the spacious private patient
rooms
and nurses station that are very similar to those on the fourth floor.
We'll meet Lorry Lewis, Director of Outcomes and Operations.
This is where our specially trained nurses use the latest high-tech
monitoring equipment over a secure wi-fi network to support our patients.
Since many of our patients are on oxygen or on ventilators, it's important to
watch them carefully for any changes.
Also on the fifth floor we have a special care unit,
or an SCU, for patients who need closer monitoring.
This unit has six beds staffed with critical care nurses.
What about the average number of patients at this LTAC?
We have the capacity for 44 patients; however, we usually stay
around 30 patients here.
Now, is that typical for an LTAC? Most LTACs have as many as 70 patients on one floor,
often by using double rooms. Within the last few years DeKalb Medical made the
decision to make all patient rooms private
at all three of its hospitals. That helps keep our patient count lower, and it's a
great benefit to them.
This is one of our patient rooms. Wow!
This seems bigger than a typical patient room. Yeah, we like to call
them patient suites.
Oh OK, yeah. We have the bed and the patient area here, and
we set up our equipment here when the patients comes in, and then we have
a family area here.
We put up our nurses and our respiratory therapists and our patient care tech so
that everybody knows who they are
have the phone numbers for the day, and then a little cork board here so that everybody
can put up their cards or whatever pictures from home.
And we added a new TV, a nice big TV so the patients can see them from the bed.
We have an accent wall over here. We painted them in different colors in all the
different rooms so that the patients have
a little color in their rooms. All of our mattresses are specialty mattresses.
All patients are on them regardless of whether they have a wound or not,
and it helps with pressure relief and comfort for the patients.
Care and comfort of patients and families is of primary importance here.
Both patient floors have comfortable waiting areas for family members
and visitors. In addition, trained specialists facilitate monthly family
support group meetings to help families have a safe place to talk with others
about what they're going through.
Executive Director Rich Graham has helped to set and maintain very high
standards of patient and family care here,
which has been recognized by many accreditation and national healthcare
organizations.
The LTACs wall of awards is a point of pride for Graham
and his staff. Hi Rich! Hi Dr. Buck.
How are you? I'm very good.
Have a seat. Thank you. We've learned so much about your impressive facility.
Thank you for sharing your staff's time with us. Well Dr. Buck, you're quite
welcome. We're glad to have you here.
You know, we are very proud of the skill team that we have here
and we have the utmost respect and care and concern for our patients.
I understand that your hospital has received national recognitions in
wound care, respiratory care and
acquired brain injury and didn't realize that that is a
unique honor
to your hospital. Yes, it is. We are very proud of those
recognitions and awards, and they have distinguished us and our care
from the other facilities in the area. And we stand behind those
awards and deliver excellent care to our patients.
Can you remind our viewers how they or their loved ones can be admitted here?
You know, we are a referral hospital which means you don't get
directly admitted here. You have to be referred to us by
your physician, your specialty physician
or another hospital. We do hope that people will consider us for long-term
acute-care
needs. We are committed to providing every patient the
best possible care!
Thanks for taking the time to learn about DeKalb Medical Long Term Acute
Care hospital in downtown Decatur.
For more information please visit the website
or call 404-501-6226.