 |
|
|
|
|
|||||||||||
 |
|
|
|||||||||||||||
|
U.S. Considering Standards of Care for Deaf |
|||||||||||||||||
|
Friday November 24 7:30 AM ET U.S. Considering Standards of Care for Deaf By Karla Gale NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Until recently, no standards of care existed for providing healthcare services to the deaf and hard of hearing. According to a presentation at the annual conference of the American Public Health Association (news - web sites), that is about to change. Dr. David M. Boan and colleagues from Delmarva Foundation for Medical Care in Easton, Maryland, and from Gallaudet University in Washington, DC, enlisted the aid of experts to draft a set of standards, guidelines and recommendations. Boan told Reuters Health that the experts included direct providers of service, people from state agencies, consumer groups, interpreters groups, self-help groups and physician researchers. Their proposals have been submitted to the US Health Care Financing Administration (HCFA) for consideration. Proposals by the panel of experts include the following: -- The provider and/or healthcare organization should be responsible for ensuring that communication does not create a barrier to the equal access to services. -- Providers should be familiar with interpreters and how to acquire and assess their services. -- Programs for educating deaf and hard-of-hearing consumers should include such topics as how to provide a clear medical history, use of emergency services and medications, and clear expression of needs. -- Providers should allow additional time for assessment and treatment, including the verification of comprehension. -- Billing procedures should be modified so that providers can bill a third party for interpreters' services. -- Hospitals should have interpreting services available on short notice, as well as accommodations that would include closed caption TV and clear labeling of patient needs on the patient's chart. -- HCFA should consider covering the services of audiologists and hearing devices under Medicare and Medicaid, as well as designating deafness/hard of hearing as a complicating condition and providing additional compensation when additional time is required to provide services. Boan told Reuters Health, ``At this time, people at HCFA are looking at these standards as voluntary guidelines, but are considering whether they'll go further with it.'' |
|||||||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||||||
| Info
for Advertisers
/ Writers
/ Press Terms of use/Disclaimer | Privacy Policy © Copyright 2000 HearingExchange.com (Division of Taylor Rose, Inc.) About us All Rights Reserved. E-mail: paula@hearingexchange.com |
|
