Leaders from the North End Rehabilitation and Nursing Center are working with Ken Scheer, MGH Center for Quality and Safety and Blair Parry, MGH Emergency Department, to evaluate the patient hand-off process from NERNC to the ED. This is an outgrowth of the Interact II research project which started in July 2009.

The North End was selected as one of ten nursing homes in Massachusetts to participate in the CMS Interact II research project. The project, sponsored through a grant from Mass Senior Care Federation, is designed to reduce the number of transfers to acute care facilities from nursing homes.

The teams continue to gather information from the staff at both ends of the transfer process to ascertain what they feel worked well and what can be improved. They also continue to follow designated care paths for the top six 'bounce-back' diagnoses in long term care settings, including: mental status changes, fever, respiratory infection, CHF, UTI and dehydration. The nursing home follows the care paths to reduce the number of avoidable transfers.