Medical Home Health Care vs. Non-medical Home Health Care…if you are reading this, you are likely among the thousands of caregivers needing help caring for a loved one at home. What is the difference?

One significant difference is who pays the bill… you or insurance?

With a doctors order and insurance that is accepted by the agency and covers home care, these services are generally covered. Medical home care provides skilled medical services such as:

Registered Nurse Physical Therapy Occupational Therapy Speech Therapy Home Health Aid Medical Social Worker

These medical personnel can only come to your home by an order from the doctor. This can be initiated by a trip to the doctor, a call to the doctor and sometimes a call to a home care agency explaining your difficulty. They can then contact the doctor.

Several questions need to be answered at this point to help you decide what you need.

Is the patient recently home from the hospital? Is the patient falling at home? Are you confused about what medications to give the patient? Is there a significant change in functional ability or decline in activity level recently? Is the patient frequently going to the ER?

Yes to 2 or more of the above questions may indicate a potential need for medical home health care.

Discussing your felt need with your doctor will help you understand the issues and the answers.

Non-medical home care

If you and your doctor have ruled out the need for medical home care but you still feel you need some help, consider non-medical home care. Non-medical care means just that. Non medical. These services are often referred to as companion services.

Your best bet is to Google “home health assistance” or the like. You can always call a business and ask if they provide non-medical home care assistance. Beware though, most medical home care company’s WILL provide solely a home health aid but at a ridiculous price. You may find better rates by hiring a company who provides only non-medical home care assistance. This is what they do best and they generally do it well.

Do your homework and use your phone. Ask the agency how long their workers have been there. Don’t be afraid to pay a little more if you feel you are following your gut. You are depending on these people to give you or your loved one the proper care and respect that they need and deserve.

You may qualify for home health care physical therapy under Medicare – it’s worth a look!

You may also want to consider how your care may be affected by the way your home care team is paid.

Depending on the nature and severity of your injuries, you may end up in a health care facility that is more specialized than a regular hospital of health center. Here are some of the types of specialized health care facilities you may be transported to, depending on the nature of your injuries.

Trauma Center
A trauma center is a hospital that is equipped to provide extensive emergency medical services to patients suffering from traumatic injuries. The injuries that a trauma center treats are ranked from Level I to Level IV, with the most serious cases at Level I facilities. Because trauma centers are expensive to run and not very common; patients outside major cities have to be airlifted to one. Washington State’s main trauma center is Harborview Medical Center which is located in Seattle, Washington.

Rehabilitation Center
A rehabilitation center is a facility where patients work to reestablish or relearn abilities they lost because of a serious injury through therapy. Physical therapy helps with movement or previous loss of movement, which occupational therapy might focus on relearning activities of daily life or finding ways to perform them despite a new disability.

Burn Center
A burn center focuses on patients with serious burns. They not only treat burn injuries, but work to help patients return to everyday life often with therapists, social workers, psychiatrists and other professionals who are not conventional doctors. Many hospitals have burn areas in them but the Specialized Burn Centers in Washington are located at Seattle’s Harborview Medical Center, Tacoma’s St. Joseph Medical Center and Spokane’s Sacred Heart Medical Center.

Assisted Living Facilities
These facilities may be appropriate for injury victims who need long-term physical or occupational therapy and help with everyday living. This might be true of someone with a severe brain injury or spinal damage. In addition to providing meals and housekeeping, as at a nursing home, the staff at an assisted living facility works with patients to help them regain independence and abilities. Some patients are able to return home eventually; others may need to remain in a facility throughout their lives.

Home care
Home care is an option for patients whose injuries do not require full time hospitalization. A nurse or other health care professional might visit everyday or a few times per week. Depending on the injuries, the professional might do anything from changing bandages to administering a treatment with an IV to helping with personal needs.

Medical terminology is a very important aspect of the health care field. If you plan on entering this prosperous field, you will need to become an expert in this unique language, as you may use it on an everyday basis. To do so, you will have to understand what it is, how it is constructed, and the ways you can learn it best.

Medical terminology is considered the language of medicine. It is a vast and widely used vocabulary that is used in medicine on a regular basis. Its words and phrases are for medical instruments, conditions, physical structures, and medical procedures. Due to the enormity of medical terminology – it contains over 100,000 terms – it can be extremely difficult to learn.

Like most languages, all of the medical terms are created from parts. If you pay close attention to the meaning of the parts, then you can determine the meanings of most of the words. As in English, medical terminology uses suffixes, prefixes, and roots to construct words. For example, “esis” refers to a condition, so when you see that suffix, you will know that the word has to do with a medical condition.

If you need help, the first place you should turn to is a medical dictionary. These are sold in bookstores everywhere. You will use this constantly because it is a dictionary just for medical terms. Therefore, whenever you do not know a word, just look it up alphabetically. In addition, there are websites that are very helpful in defining medical terms, like dictionary websites. Simply plug the term into the search engine and you will be given the meaning.

You will need to understand, or be able to decipher, medical terms for all careers in medicine; however, one career that is the most demanding when it comes to medical terminology is medical transcription. In this career, medical transcriptionists take down everything they hear as they listen to recordings by physicians. This may be for medical reports, autopsy reports, or medical history. This is a very important job in which medical terminology plays a very significant role.

Why is this “language” so important? You might think it is only a small facet of medicine, but would you call the English language a small facet of your life? It is not; in fact, it is an enormous part of everything! The same is in medicine. Essentially, if you screw up on a term or phrase, it can be a life-threatening mistake. Therefore, make learning this language a very important aspect of your medical education.

There is a class that can help you learn this detailed jargon. Introduction to Medical Terminology may be a required course for you if you are entering the medical field. If it is not, you should consider it anyway – it could help you enormously. This will be an opportunity for you to learn about the roots, the suffixes, and the prefixes that make up the words, as well as the full meanings. You may discuss case studies, research, and medical documents, practicing the use of the terms.