Case Study Summary

Case Study Summary
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Case Study Summary
Jankowski, J., Seastrum, T., Swidler, R. N., & Shelton, W. (2009). For Lack of a Better Plan: A Framework for Ethical, Legal, and Clinical Challenges in Complex Inpatient Discharge Planning. HEC Forum, 21(4):311-326
Summary of article
Complicated inpatient discharge dilemmas often come up whenever patients are medically ready to leave the hospital but they refuse or lack a safe plan for going back to the community or to the post-acute care setting. The purpose of this article is to propose a new theoretical framework for analyzing intricate inpatients hospital discharge dilemmas. The new framework is presented as a novel way of analyzing current discharge problems. The authors aim to offer medical professionals a well thought-out way that they can use to approach obstacles to inpatient discharge, as well as new ways of considering and designing health care policy so as to lessen needless discharge delays and better serve patients (Jankowski et al., 2009).
With regard to how the research was conducted, Jankowski et al. (2009) defined explicitly each of the components of the new theoretical framework, demonstrated using a hypothetical case, and then discussed from ethical, legal, as well as practical problem-solving points of view. Regarding the results, the novel framework proposed by Jankowski et al. (2009) is to be employed in examining discharge barriers in terms of 3 extensive categories, which are patient-system focused, system-focused, and patient focused cases. In itself, the framework does not offer normative solutions to substantive ethical issues that pertain to discharge planning. Instead, it provides caregivers with greater clearness as to the sort of case with which they are dealing.
Meaning/implication of the results
Even though Jankowski et al. (2009) present a novel analytical framework including a subset of common hindrances, they have not adequately discussed literature that supports the new framework which they are presenting in this article. Moreover, the framework proposed in the article does not in itself present normative solutions to substantive ethical issues pertaining to discharge planning, and this is a major flaw with the article. Another flaw with the article is that in defining the components of the new theoretical framework, Jankowski et al. (2009) have illustrated very few hypothetical cases, only three, one in each component of the framework: system-focused; person-focused; and a blended category of system-focused and person-focused. The other flaw is that Jankowski et al. (2009) included only older people who were aged 55 and above, in the hypothetical cases, minorities and children have not b...