General Discussion

Not every case manager is an in-person case manager. SEcondly, I'm not 'contracted" to do anything specifically. I work with a practice of 12 MD's and 6 NP's who do in home visits as the patient's PCP's. These providers then task me (and my coworkers) with things like setting up specialist appointments, getting them hooked up with transportation, following up on their missing CPAP machine. I order DME, lab and diagnostic tests, and follow up with visits to their specialists.

I call the patients on a regular basis, depending on their needs, and do well-checks, weight checks, blood sugar monitoring. I do telephonic education.

Who checks? The doctors who see them once a month. The NP's who see them between PCP visits. They know what was ordered and they get updates if the patient doesn't meet medicare guidelines for that equipment to be covered. We are in constant contact with the MD's. Everything they order gets done. We are the lifeline of these patients who are elderly, poor, with great health and social needs, and most of them are unable to leave their homes. The patients sure as shit make sure to let us know what their needs are, as the MD tells them "heddi will call you this week with appointment information for your lung doctor". Trust me, there is accountability from myself, my coworkers, my physicians, and my boss, and the patients.

I also work in conjunction with community-based case managers who do meet with the patients in person, but they don't do as much "behind the scenes" work that I and my other RN coworkers do, again with appointments, transportation, orders, and followup to tie it all in a nice bow.

I mean, I'm not sitting at home with my feet up eating bon bons, with my wang flapping in the wind. I do not leave that desk from 8am-5pm. I also get inbound telephone calls from people calling our main office number. I get roughly 25-40 inbound calls a day, in addition to the 2 MD's that are my primary MD's and their patients and the outbound calls I have to do.