By Mark Hansel
NKyTribune managing editor
State Sen. Chris McDaniel, R-Latonia, took advantage of the break in the General Assembly’s short session to visit Woodcrest Nursing & Rehabilitation Center in Elsmere last week.
State Sen.Chris McDaniel chats with Boone County resident Robert Klette, during the visit to Woodcrest Thursday.
Franklin Nathan, administrator for Woodcrest, invited McDaniel to tour the facility’s pulmonary unit and see firsthand the latest strategies in long term care, during a recent trip to Frankfort.
“The skilled nursing care setting is offering an array of health care services designed to reduce re-hospitalizations and return folks back home to their communities,” said Nathan. “Meeting with our state lawmakers and showing them firsthand the quality of care we provide as well as discussing the challenges long term care providers face with an influx of elderly residents in the future, is the first step to ensuring the very best care for Kentucky’s seniors.”
McDaniel said he wanted to not only see the facility, but also get input from those receiving treatment, including a woman who asked the senator to get her some desert.
“These folks are just as valuable as any member of our society, but frankly, the elderly and the infirm just get neglected and that’s not fair because they are good people,” McDaniel said. “Sometimes they just wanted someone to listen or, as I found out today, maybe someone to get them rice and pudding. I probably filled as much of a need for a constituent there, as at almost any other time.”
Sen. McDaniel, left, speaks with Woodcrest Nursing and Rehabilitation Center administrator Franklin Nathan during a visit to the facility Thursday (photos by Mark Hansel).
McDaniel toured Woodcrest’s pulmonary unit that implements the Breathe Again program for residents with compromised respiratory conditions. The program has a level of sophistication often not found in the post-acute setting after patients have been discharged from the hospital.
“Restoring patients to their best possible state of health is not an easy mission, but receiving the right care at the right time and in a healthcare setting conducive to a successful transition from hospital treatment is making a difference in the lives of our elderly,” Nathan said. “Our model of care at Woodcrest is producing health outcomes all doctors, patients and their family members want to see.”
Having a top-of-the-line pulmonary program in the skilled nursing setting provides a continuity of care that has long been needed, given Kentucky has one of the highest rates of smoking in the country and ten percent of the population has been diagnosed with Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD).
Nathan said that because of its history as a tobacco state Kentucky has the highest rate of COPD in the country, as well as a lot of related breathing issues.
“We have found a piece of the care that was not being met,” Nathan said. “People coming out of a hospital that had pulmonary problems either went home or to a pulmonary unity in a long-term cute care facility. If they go home, it often becomes an in-and-out to the hospital, draining resources that could be used for other people in need.”
McDaniel met with Nathan and members of the Woodcrest staff before touring the facility and speaking with patients individually and in a group, in a visit that lasted more than an hour.
Contact Mark Hansel at mark.hansel@nkytrib.com
