Home Health Care: Choose Wisely

Many people don't think about it until it's too late, but home health care is something that you should consider before hospitals or nursing homes become your only option. Realistically, wouldn't you want your children to keep you around after you are unable to take care of yourself, in the comfort of your own home?

If you have not run across the idea of home health care yet in your travels, it combines the best of many worlds of care. The same quality of care a patient would get in a hospital is transferred to a private residence, where the patient is the sole focus of a trained professional on hand.

The person will be trained in many basic and advanced parts of the treatment process, including having knowledge of nutrition, IV's, patient and caregiver processes, occupational and dietary therapy, and a consistent knowledge of anything medically related that specific person needs to be health and safe in the home environment.

If medical agencies are smart, they always have an arm of their service that includes the ability of their staff to go on home health care assignments. This is because is can be beneficial to all parties involved, as the correct utilization of resources saves everyone time and money, and people use that to their advantage.

If you are worried about certain conditions for your parent, here are some things that home health care deals with as well - helping them eat and drink properly, basic cooking and cleaning, checking temperature and breathing, if they need assistance getting into and out of bed, if they need a helping hand with things like bathing or using the bathroom.

One of the first things that you should discuss is the plan of care. That is a document that details all of the daily, short term, and long term aspects of the care, from who is going to take care of what, to the types of medical equipment that needs to be on hand, to deciding which treatments are going to take how long and when results should be seen.

Staff should always be determined to improve their service as well. If you have noticed that your home health care provided has become lazy or does not take as much interest in the client as they should, you should immediately start shopping around for a better place to hire from. Improvement is always the key.

It's not an easy decision sending a loved one to a hospital or nursing home, so make the right choice and instead have the hospital come to you. The service can be excellent, and you'll feel more connected instead of guilty as time goes by and your parents are still happy.

Health Care Industry's Growing Profession

The nursing profession is one of the most needed careers today. There have been shortages of trained and licensed nurses everywhere especially in the United States which is the reason why the nurses working in the health facilities have a lot of responsibilities and take different roles.

The different roles that nurses take include providing bedside care to the patients and ensuring that each patient receives the utmost attention and care. The nurses are `lso responsible in giving the treatments prescribed by the physician to the patients. These roles that the nurses take are not just limited to hospital settings. A lot of other job opportunities for nurses are already present including nursing job in the military, positions in public relations or health insurance companies, job openings at schools as school nurses or educators and opportunities as travel nurses. Nurses providing service at home, nurses working in the government also known as public health nurses and even nurses becoming writers who write about the industry where they belong are the other careers that a trained and licensed nurse can do these days.

To be a registered nurse and be able to work for the different job opportunities available as mentioned, one should enter a training program specifically designed for nurses. There are different programs available such as entry-level training program, Bachelor of Science in Nursing (BSN), Master of Science in nursing (MSN) and a doctorate program (PhD).

The entry-level training program involves a two-year degree of teaching students the essential information a nurse must know to be able to practice nursing effectively and safely. Training courses are also included in this program for the students to develop the important skills that nurses should have.

An entry-level nursing graduate can also be hired in a health facility where he would attend an orientation for a period of six weeks to familiarize him with the job that he should do in the hospital. After the orientation, evaluation in terms of the performance is done. After a good evaluation, he can then be trained again to another aspect of the health care industry. This training/orientation can be repeatedly done until the hospital is sure that he can provide quality health care in any nursing fields.

The BSN program is taken up for four years and is more detailed and has a wider range of coverage than the two-year associate program. Students under this program are expected to gain an extensive knowledge on the medical field and health care. They are also trained to deal with real-time situations where problem solving skills and critical thinking are also developed. Most institutions acquire nurses with a BSN degree thus more people take this program.

The MSN degree can be obtained by already licensed nurses who have been in the profession for a time and still wanted to learn more about their craft. Nurses who have this degree are often given greater responsibilities such as being nurse practitioners or administrators.

Once the MSN degree is obtained, the PhD or the doctorate level can also be acquired through another period of study. Nurses with this degree can be placed in any position in any health care aspect.

Any person who is interested in health care should have a nursing career since it is the most progressive field in the industry and a lot of job opportunities are readily available once you are already a registered nurse.

Questions on the Legality of the Health Care Tax Law

Recently, there have been several controversies about the legality of the Health Care Law and many Americans are confused as to whether the law was actually constitutionally passed or whether there was a flaw in the way it was passed. What are the basics of how federal laws are passed? Is the Health Care Law, indeed, constitutional and was it was correctly passed?

How Federal Laws Get Passed

For a bill to become public law, a motion or bill needs to be introduced either into the House of Representatives or in the Senate. The bill is either sponsored by an individual member of the two law making houses or it may be co-sponsored by several members. Once introduced, it is handed over to a committee that gets further details and information on the bill and eventually votes before returning the bill to the house where it was introduced. The bill is then debated on and finally, a vote is taken and if the bill passes by a majority vote, it is forwarded to the alternative law making entity - The Senate bill to the House of Representatives and vice versa. The other house debates and may make adjustments to the bill. A vote is then taken and if the majority pass it, it is adopted by the house. If the two bills are different due to amendments, then one of the houses must accept the version of the other house. Once there is a consensus on the law to be passed, the bill is sent to the president for signing. The president can either veto or accept the bill. If he or she signs the bill, the bill becomes public law.

The Passing of the Health Care law

For the Health Care law, all these stages and procedures were fulfilled:

    Introduction - The Health care bill was introduced into the House of Representatives on September 17, 2009 and was sponsored by Rep. Charles B Rangel (Democrat -New York). The bill was forwarded to the committee in charge and the committee returned the bill to the house for debating and voting.
    Passing of Bill by House of Representatives - Upon debating, the bill was passed in the House of Representatives by a majority of 243-173.
    Receipt by Senate - The bill was then forwarded to the senate on October 8th, 2009 and after the committal stage and debates, the Senate made several adjustments to the bill.
    Passing of Bill by Senate - The amended bill was then passed in the Senate with a majority vote of 60-39
    House Adopts Senate Amendments - After consultation, the House of Representatives adopted the Senates adjustments of the Heath Care bill on March 21, 2010.
    The President Signs Bill into Public Law - On March 23, 2010, President Obama signed the Health Care bill into public law

Rob L Daniel and partners of Limon Whitaker & Morgan, for years have helped businesses and individuals Nationwide, with their delinquent IRS & State tax problems. The firm is based in Los Angeles, California USA. http://www.limonwhitaker.com / Tel:888.321.6188

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Standard Mobile Devices Do Not Comply With Healthcare Security Requirements

As medical service providers increasingly use mobile phones and devices to view medical records and access patient databases, mobile data security has become a growing issue of concern in the healthcare industry.

Medical records contain an abundance of personal information such as name, date of birth, Social Security number, credit-card numbers, and employer information, making these records a prime target for cybercriminals. According to a recent article, between January and May 2012, 29 healthcare security breaches had already occurred, affecting approximately 935,000 individuals.

According to the Office of the National Coordinator for Health and Information Technology (ONC), off-the-shelf smartphones in today's market typically meet 40 percent of security requirements called for by HIPPA and MU Stage 2 Standards. On the high end of the spectrum, iPhones and BlackBerrys only achieve 60 percent of the recommended criteria after manual configuration.

Currently, ONC is conducting research that will assist small to medium sized health care provider organizations secure mobile devices that process health data. Mobile security for these organizations is essential, as they may not have an IT department or data security partner to manage their devices and the sensitive information that they hold. Implementing the appropriate security applications for these devices will safeguard against the loss of patient data.

The ONC is also in the process of compiling a list of best practices for various mobile security scenarios. This guide, published later this year, will outline wireless pitfalls such as unsecured WiFi access, email on mobile smartphones and unsupervised "bring-your-own-device" methods. Circulating these best practices throughout a national healthcare network will assist smaller medical service providers in adopting and executing health IT.

When implementing security for mobile devices, healthcare facilities should also consider how to securely dispose of wireless devices once they have reached the end-of-life. Data security breaches can occur even after a mobile device has been retired and medical service providers need to dispose of devices in a way that does not jeopardize patient data. Partnering with a certified mobile phone buyback and recycling company ensures retired healthcare devices are put through a comprehensive, multi-step mobile data deletion process that keeps confidential information secure.

Developing health IT is essential to ensure mobile phones and devices in the healthcare industry remain protected. Hospitals and health providers have a responsibility to their patients to maintain the proper and secure handling of wireless devices. Additional protocols need to be established assuring out-of-the-box smartphones are protected from data breaches.

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Demand for Healthcare Professionals Continues To Rise

Despite a rocky economy, the demand for qualified healthcare professionals continues to rise. There will always be a need for qualified individuals who desire to have a career that is focused on caring for people of all ages. With the implementation of the Affordable Care Act and a variety of career options in the healthcare field you are looking at the opportunity to embark on a career that works for you and gets you working too.

Affordable Care Act Creates Jobs
There are many benefits that the Affordable Care Act has brought to California. According to The US Department of Health and Human Services* March 2012 article titled, Two Years Later: The Benefits of the Affordable Care Act for California, California has been able to start implementing an overhaul and stabilization of their entire healthcare system because of the Affordable Care Act and receiving over $459.6 million in funds to enact policies to improve healthcare. The improvements have led to a demand for more people to enter the healthcare field, resulting in desirable opportunities for people to enroll in healthcare vocational schools to get the training they need to be a part of the healthcare field. Opportunity is calling you.

Opportunities to Embark On a New Career Path
There are several factors that are important when you are looking at a new career choice in the healthcare field. They include receiving quality healthcare training that will provide pathways for getting hired and earning an income that allows you opportunities to grow financially. In California, the US Department of Bureau and Labor Statistics** indicates in March 2012 data that California licensed practical and vocational nurses counted for 4.56 out of every 1,000 jobs in 2011. That is fantastic and what makes it even more exciting is the fact that California ranks second in the United States for average pay for those professions. Knowing that you can have a career that is in demand and financially rewarding is exciting. The healthcare field will always rely on compassionate, caring, and qualified individuals to work in it.

When you are deciding what career field you want to work in it is important to consider available opportunities and your financial compensation. The healthcare field is exciting because it continues to be in demand, has excellent healthcare training programs, and allows you the opportunity to work in a field that offers favorable compensation. If you are thinking of making a change in your career that will change your life, consider entering the healthcare field and be a part of a career opportunity that is on the rise. There's a demand for people like you.

*According to The US Department of Health and Human Services, March 2012 article titled Two Years Later: The Benefits of the Affordable Care Act for California, California has been able to overhaul and stabilize the entire healthcare system. Part of that benefit leads to job creation. To date, California has received over $459.6 million dollars to improve its health care system. (Source: http://www.healthcare.gov, 04/2012).

**According to the US Department of Bureau and Labor Statistics, California licensed practical and vocational nurses count for 4.56 out of every 1,000 jobs and rank second highest in average pay. (Source: http://www.bls.gov, 04/2012).