I was planning more posts for the Psychiatric Hospitalization series, and then realized that so much of what still needed to be covered focuses on how care teams consider the details of discharge planning.
Since many hospitalizations are brief, part of inpatient care planning is to help determine which resources would support a patient over the next several weeks or months as they work towards full recovery. These services are not usually provided by the hospital, and many are beyond their control. But referrals and advocacy from the inpatient care team can help organize these services on the patient's behalf.
To help with this planning, teams tend to have several common conversations that help with making decisions.
Rather than try to put all of that information into a single, complex post, I'll spend time on each conversation separately to provide readers an overview. As with the hospitalization series, I'll use the example of a patient who is able to engage meaningfully with the care team, and therefore can play a large part in developing their care plan.
This is not every patient who is admitted. By definition, hospitalization is the highest level of psychiatric care, and some patients arrive very sick and have very complex needs. For many patients who are not able to participate in these conversations, an advocate, family member, or medical decision maker may be the one to participate instead.
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