Nursing home's new role in the health care continuum

One of the ideas being proposed with the healthcare reform bill that has been embraced by healthcare professionals and lauded as a key to the future is the integrated coordination of care: the concept of a continuum. A continuum of aging services is a comprehensive and integrated network of services that guides and tracks patients/clients over time and includes acute, transitional, long-term and preventive care. An integrated continuum requires active collaboration among local providers in 2 general groups. The first includes hospitals, nursing homes, retirement communities, physicians and home health services. The 2nd group is social or community-based service. Five major reasons for considering involvement with a continuum of care and some of the steps to take in getting started are presented.