AB 364, Hospital Discharge Policy

AB 364, Berg
Discharge Policy: Pre-Admission Screening.

People who saw Michael Moore's SiCKO will never forget the episode of the homeless woman who could not afford her hospital bill being put in a taxi and dumped in a street in a skid row area of Los Angeles, mentally confused and with nothing but the hospital gown she was wearing. (See clip on hospital dumping.)

This is the tip of the hospital dumping iceberg. Every day in California, patients, particularly elderly patients, are discharged under pressure before they feel medically ready to leave, or without adequate support on the outside. CARA is starting a state-wide campaign to address this problem, with meetings to allow people to tell their experiences, to inform them of their current rights, and to build support for AB 364, a law to eliminate hospital discharge abuses. (Flyer for event.)

AB 364 will require that prior to hospital discharge, patients be informed of the availability of home and community-based options. It requires that prior to a transfer of an older adult patient to any skilled nursing facility, the patient be assessed by a preadmission screening to ensure the appropriateness of the proposed skilled nursing facility placement.

Assembly Member Berg and her staff are collecting information about what provisions should be in AB 364 to best protect seniors and disabled people from unsafe hospital discharge, and CARA has been important in this process. CARA sponsored a recent informational briefing for the Assembly Committee on Aging and Long Term Care in Sacramento, where we gave personal examples of the different ways unsafe hospital discharge occurs and presented a dramatization of the problem. A similar hearing is scheduled in southern California, where CARA will play the same important role. (Photo of hearing)

Read letter CARA has written about AB 364 here.

AB 364 is a 2 year bill and will be first heard in the Assembly Health Committee.

AB 364 must pass Assembly Health Committee and
then the Assembly Aging and Long Term Care Committee by Jan. 25, 2008.

AB 364 must be passed by the entire Assembly by Jan. 31, 2008.

Votes needed from Assembly Health Committee (what's my district?):

Dymally (D-52, Chair), Nakanishi (R-10, Vice Chair), Berg (D-1), Gaines (R-4), Jones (D-9), Ma (D-12), Hancock (D-14), Hayashi (D-18), Lieber (D-22), Strickland (R-37), de Leon (D-45), Bass (D-47), De La Torre (D-50), Hernandez (D-57), Huff (R-60), Emmerson (R-63), Salas (D-79)

Votes needed from Assembly Aging and Long Term Care Committee (what's my district?):

Berg, (D-1, Chair), Anderson (R-77, Vice-Chair), Levine (D-40), Brownley (D-41), Carter (D-62), and Walters (R-73)

Hey, Southern California CARA members and CARA Action Teams (CATS). It's time to start preparing for Assembly Member Berg's hearing on unsafe hospital discharges on (date).

Have you, or your family, or your friends been discharged from a hospital while you were still sick or injured? Or before you had adequate backup at home? Were you transferred to a nursing home that could not meet your needs? How could the discharge have been made safer? How could it have been delayed until it would be safer? Write down your stories and thoughts.

See the CARA Legislative Committee tracking report on Calif bills.

Read LegInfo, the official legislative website, on AB 364.

(Leginfo, the Official California Legislative Information website, describes Senate and Assembly bills, with texts, current status, analyses comparing the current situation with changes a bill would make, anticipated fiscal impacts, supporting and opposing arguments and organizations, and other valuable information.)

back to CARA's priority bills.

California Alliance for Retired Americans
600 Grand Ave., Room 410, Oakland, CA 94610
(510) 663-4086
info@CaliforniaAlliance.org
www.californiaalliance.org