Robbinsdale Family Chooses Home Healthcare For Girl With Birth Defects
MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) -- It's an option more families are choosing for a loved one with complex medical problems -- creating a hospital setting at home.
And it appears to be a growing national trend. The goal is to provide better care for seriously ill patients.
Doctors say people who've tried it get more sleep, more physical activity and they recover faster. For a Robbinsdale family, it has turned out even better than they imagined.
Aubrielle Howley is 3 years old. She was born with several birth defects that made it difficult for her to move and to eat.
Aubrielle spent the first year of her life in the intensive care unit of a Minneapolis hospital.
"The back and forth, we had to divide a lot. It was like you go up to the hospital. We had conferences going on, meetings with doctors. And you stay home with Lilia. It was divide and conquer," Kelly Howley, Aubrielle's mother, said.
With her doctor's approval, two years ago, Aubrielle's parents decided to bring her home so they could have more time together as a family. They hired a home health care company - Pediatric Home Service - to outfit her bedroom with medical equipment, and provide a nurse 18 hours a day.
"I think once it was all set up, the shock of it initially was there. And then you have no choice, you have to figure out how to work around this," Kelly Howley said.
"A home environment is a very developmentally rich and stimulating environment. In a hospital setting, they are confined to a bed for the most part," Dr. Roy Maynard with Pediatric Home Service said.
Dr. Maynard says home care can also be less expensive than hospital care.
"(She's gotten better) Much faster, especially in the last six, seven months. She had all this walking equipment and everything, and she just, she just did it on her own. Hardly used any of it," Dustin Howley, Aubrielle's father, said.
"Now she's walking and some days she's running," Kelly Howley said.
Pediatric Home Service says their staff is taking care of about 5,000 patients in Minnesota.
