A project in Kentucky called the “Community Transition Program” provides education, resources, and care coordination for individuals who have had strokes and moving between care facilities and their home.
The program jointly funded by the University of Kentucky Center for Excellence in Rural Health https://ruralhealth.med.uky.edu and the Appalachian Regional Healthcare www.arh.org a not-for-profit health system serving residents across Eastern Kentucky and Southern West Virginia.
The program helps stroke survivors communicate with providers, insurers, and provide information on how to connect with community resources. The pilot found that it is very important to connect patients to the program while they are still in the hospital to establish a trusting relationship and to reduce gaps in care.
Also, it was recently announced that ten Kentucky healthcare systems have formed a State-wide Health Care Collaborative. The primary objective is to raise the standards of care across the state, address the state’s poor health statistics, and reduce the cost of care through greater operational efficiencies.
The Collaborative is still in its early stages of development and there are still many details that need to be finalized. Decisions have to be made as what issues and opportunities for improvement will be tackled first.