Hospital Care At Home To Be The New Norm?

A building with the capitol in the background.


There is growing interest to shift hospital services into patients’ homes, a movement that started even prior to the outbreak of COVID-19.  Startups are providing technology to bring medical services into the home and well-known Venture Capital companies are backing them.  Hospitals are finding that some common illnesses like urinary-tract infections can be effectively treated at home.  This is a very common ailment for seniors and it would be great to see them recover from this at home.  Hospital-at-home care hasn’t taken off in large part due to the fact that insurance companies haven’t covered it.  However, many are trying to convince Medicare and private insurance companies with data published in the Annals of Internal Medicine showing home hospitalization reduced costs, healthcare use and readmissions, while increasing physical activity compared with typical hospital care.  In addition, Medicare recently introduced a new program whereby hospitals can be reimbursed for home care they provide to patients during the pandemic.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/crop-of-startups-move-hospital-care-into-the-home-11614853803

Monterey, CA Coronavirus Update From A Carmel Caregiver : CA Cases Approach 50K

A close up of a cell with viruses inside


There were 132 new coronavirus cases reported in Monterey County today. This brings the total to 42,016, with two new deaths reported.  Nationally, the numbers are better.  There were only 59,462 new cases reported, for a cume total of 28.2 million cases.  There were 1,825 deaths, for a total of 501,014.  In California, there were 4,338 new cases for a total of 3.5 million, with 205 new deaths.  That makes for a grand total of almost 50K deaths in our state.  On the good news front, a new study suggest that both the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines may also prevent infections.  The Mayo Clinic studied 31K people who had received at least one dose of either vaccine.  They found the vaccines to be more than 80% effective at preventing infection for 36 days after the first dose.  Vaccine efficacy was 75% 15 days after the first dose and 89% effective from 36 days after the first dose.