Mom broke leg 9/25. Dr ordered 4-6 wks to heal before full weight bearing rehab. How can Rehab kick her out before 6 weeks and rehab starts. One month after break and repair surgery, Rehab Center kicking her out - has Medicare and Anthem and dr says with rehab can walk again but kind of break will take 4-6 weeks to heal. Rehab called one month after break to say has reached "plateau" and cannot stay there as of 10/30. Her prognosis for recovery to walk again is good with rehab but only once healed and can bear weight on the leg again. She broke hip and August and was at Rehab Center in patient a week from coming home from hip rehab when fell in her room and broke leg on same side as healing hip. Can they really kick her out or make her pay for the rehab now??? HELP!!!!!!
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Carol
Out of curiosity, is this a big rehab facility - almost like a hospital setting and does very intense & highly skilled rehab care, like massive trauma cases? If so, then a patient like your mom (elderly with hip & leg break) isn't really their type of patient so she doesn't "fit" for how this facility is run. Someone else posted a question like yours on this site a few months ago and that was the situation - their mom was at a trauma rehab hospital and was discharged for not making progress. They were able to get her into a NH.
What I'd suggest is that you speak with one of the social workers asap to find a NH facility that has a rehab wing for your mom to be discharged to for followup care. None of this is cheap but the r&b day rate @ a NH will be much less than that of a trauma center. Also if she doesn't get ambulatory, she can be admitted as a permanent resident of the NH and if you have to go the Medicaid route for NH payment, she will have the medical history needed in her file for the medical necessity review that is a part of the Medicaid application. Good luck.
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She still needs some medical care, but not hospital, before she will be ready for rehab only. He is sending her to a "step down" medical facility until she is ready to do PT rehab so she doesn't burn her days up just waiting until she is well enough to rehab. I am SO thankful he saw that need and the hospital assigned a caseworker to her to make arrangements according to her Medicare restrictions. I am sorry you are dealing with this. It was explained to us that it often happens because the family (my husband and I) didn't get involved regarding understanding the elder's insurance benefits before the crisis and we would have just been out of luck because these fees are due up front at these facilities we were using. I am so thankful that the Dr got involved, but it certainly isn't normal that it happened like that, it isn't their duty, it was ours and we failed. Good Luck and thanks for sharing your story, you may save someone else the headache.