Choosing a rehabilitation facility can be difficult, especially since the options seem endless. You may not know where to start or how to narrow down your search. To help you make an informed decision about which hospital is right for you and your loved one, we have compiled our top six tips on choosing a rehabilitation hospital below:
- Does it offer your rehabilitation needs?
Before choosing a rehabilitation hospital, you should know what types of rehabilitative services are offered there. Rehabilitation hospitals offer different kinds of treatment depending on the needs/condition of their patients; therefore, your specific needs or that of your family members must be met before deciding to commit to any particular facility.
If you are recovering from heart surgery, you may need cardiac rehab services to improve postoperative outcomes and decrease future medical risks that could lead to death or disability. You need the right amount of physical therapy, occupational therapy, speech-language pathology, nursing support (RNs), respiratory therapists (RTs), pharmacists who can provide medication management; otherwise, each day will feel like more of an uphill battle; towards recovery than it should be!
- Are your rehabilitation needs covered by your health insurance cover?
Health insurance policies vary in terms of the types and amounts of coverage they offer. It is important to know what your health insurance can cover before committing to one facility over another since it will ultimately affect how much you pay out-of-pocket each month/year for care. For example, suppose you have an HMO insurance plan that does not include rehab services or has a small number of therapy visits allowed per year. In that case, it may be best for your recovery needs if you receive at least some rehabilitative services through Medicare (or Medicaid in certain states). If so, choose a rehabilitation hospital with which accepts both private payment options as well as Medicare.
- Does the facility serve you or your kin’s dietary needs?
Some rehab hospitals offer specialized dietitian support to patients who need it. If you or your loved ones have specific nutritional requirements, ensure that those are met at each hospital before choosing which rehabilitation facility is best for you/them!
Look into whether the facilities accommodate kosher diets, vegan diets, gluten-free diets, and other types of special dietary restrictions as well. Make sure that they do not contain certain allergens such as nuts (i.e., peanuts), too, since food allergies can cause serious health emergencies if ignored by staff members working in kitchens at any given care center.
- What are the qualifications of the facility’s staff members?
Qualified, credentialed & experienced rehab professionals can make a world of difference when it comes to health outcomes. Another important factor to consider before choosing a rehabilitation hospital is how qualified their nurses (RNs) or physicians are as well as any other support personnel that works with you or your kin’s.
The success rate on recovery could potentially depend partially on the competence of your nurses, physicians, among others, to understand how important it is that you follow specific post-surgical protocols closely.
Therefore, make sure that any rehabilitation hospital you choose has a satisfactory track record in terms of having qualified staff members working at each one before committing!
- What is the cost of rehabilitation at this facility?
In some cases, people don’t even bother asking about a rehab center’s price because they assume that all of them will be similarly expensive. However: This may not necessarily be true & it could also vary depending on what type(s) of insurance coverage you have available to pay for the treatment costs since each policy has different stipulations in terms of how much medical aid it covers!
It is important to ask about prices before committing, especially if you or the family member needs wheelchair accessible transportation or a special toilet seat installed inside house so that there can be gradual transitioning back into living an independent life after recovery from surgery – which means these types of accommodations would need to be purchased since it is a rehab requirement.
- Quality outcomes of the facility
Quality outcomes refer to how well a person recovers from their disability after staying at the rehabilitation hospital. In this sense, quality outcomes can be measured as what percentage of people who stay at a certain rehab center actually recover fully and go back home without any physical or/and cognitive disabilities that impact them negatively afterward.
However: This is not an easy thing to measure objectively since it depends on many different factors besides just where your loved one stays during their time away recovering from surgery (that is, other important decisions such as whether or not they follow all doctor’s orders & adheres to discharge instructions, etc.). By going through the facility’s reviews and testimonials, you can get a better idea about what other people say the quality of care is like at this facility and whether or not they were satisfied with it.
