Dr. Eric ColemanSpeaker and Booking Agent Information

Working closely with patients and families health care providers and policymakers Coleman is addressing system-wide deficiencies that too often result in subsequent poor patient outcomes.Elderly patients are particularly vulnerable during these displacements; an estimated 20 percent of Medicare patients discharged to their homes from hospitals are readmitted within thirty days and the majority of these costly readmissions are preventable.

Through rigorous empirical studies and insights gleaned from extensive interviews with patients and their families Coleman has quantified the scope of the problem and devised predictive metrics and improvements for coordinated and seamless transfers of care.

His Care Transitions Intervention led by nurses and social workers trained as Care Transitions Coaches equips patients and caregivers with critical knowledge and skills to enable self-care including a complete personal health record with associated physician information; a reconciled list of medications; a timeline for follow-up appointments; and a list of red flags or signs that the patient’s condition is deteriorating.

Coleman has documented the success of this model in terms of both patient satisfaction and reductions in hospital readmissions through the Care Transitions Measure; as a result his innovative prescriptions have been adopted nationally and internationally most notably as essential elements in Medicare’s Community-Based Care Transitions Program a new national initiative.

Bringing these and related interventions to even greater scale here and abroad has the potential to improve substantially the care and health outcomes of millions of older adults suffering from chronic illness saving many lives and much money.