Reaction to hospital lawsuit

A hospital has been sued for discharging a patient onto the street. This patient was discovered on the streets with a severe leg infection.

Well, what can be said about this. Well, the first thing that I wondered when I saw this was, where was the patient's case manager? It is the job of the case manager to find placement for patients after they discharge. However, if this person was homeless, I am assuming that they did not have insurance. This person could still have been sent someplace, even a homeless shelter. This person should not have been put back out onto the streets. One thing that most hospitals attempt to reduce is readmissions, if you send a homeless person back out onto the street without care, then of course it would lead to a readmission. Back when I was in nursing school, I did some of my clinicals with Outreach. Homeless people at the Outreach center had access to food and facilities. They were even driven to doctor's offices for appointment, and to pharmacies for medication. Couldn't this person have been sent into a program that provides this?

In an attempt to avoid this from reoccurring the hospital has new policies in place. One thing to always remember, is that everything should be treated as a learning experience. No hospital is perfect. There is always room for improvement.