Developing a Comprehensive Future Care Model by Diagnosis

If you are a participant in the delivery of health care today, the following have probably been on your radar screen: evidence-based practice, budget management and cost containment, patient/family engagement, patient safety, and variability in care delivered. Most likely, you have been asked to participate on a committee for one of these topics or possibly have submitted ideas regarding these to a supervisor or even presented a poster or a session for a local, regional, or national meeting. These topics will continue to drive change in the health care settings in which we work, especially as the 80 million aging baby boomers begin to hit the inpatient beds in our hospitals.1 Decreasing reimbursement alone is enough to make acute care take a second look at care delivery as we know it. Frankly, changing care delivery models could impact all of the above areas of concern.