From the Connecticut Hospital Association

The Hartford HealthCare Center for Healthy Aging, based in Southington, provided support last year for more than 18,000 seniors, one-third of whom identify as low-income.

The Center for Healthy Aging turned out to be a godsend for Rita, a 90-year-old woman with multiple healthcare and social needs.  When Rita was prescribed a new medication that made her feel ill, she considered stopping the medication or visiting the ED.  The first option could have been life-threatening, and the second would have been very expensive. Instead, Rita called the Center, a free resource and assessment center for seniors and their families that serves as a single point of entry for older people struggling to navigate the complexities of the healthcare system.  The Center links seniors with multiple chronic conditions and other complicating socio-economic risk factors to the resources and supports they need to stay healthy.

At the Center, Rita was immediately connected with an assessment specialist who arranged for a return visit to her primary care physician.  The doctor prescribed an alternative medicine that Rita was better able to tolerate.  With one encounter, Rita felt better and an expensive, unnecessary hospital stay was avoided.

It’s an example of why the Center for Healthy Aging has earned the 2017 Connecticut’s Hospital Community Service Award from the Connecticut Hospital Association and the Connecticut Department of Public Health. (The award will be presented at the the Connecticut Hospital Association’s 99th annual meeting June 14 in Wallingford.)

Established in 2004 as a partnership between Hartford HealthCare Senior Services and The Hospital of Central Connecticut, the Center has grown to include sites at five hospitals.

Anyone who calls or walks in has immediate access to a trained professional who can assess the situation and link them with appropriate care and services.  This might include meals, transportation, healthcare, or community and government assistance.

The program is funded through an annual contribution from Hartford HealthCare and a grant from the Connecticut Department of Social Services, which saw the value of this model to support low-income elderly clients who are eligible for both Medicare and Medicaid (dual eligible) in the central region.  Services for this population include health coaching, home assessments, formal and informal caregiver training, educational events, support groups, screenings (blood pressure, memory, glucose, and cholesterol), and geriatric care management following a hospital stay.

The Center staff includes 12 employees. Besides providing direct services, the Center has developed and distributed more than 25,000 free copies of its own resource guides and tools that supplement existing educational resources and reflect needs spotlighted in each hospital’s community needs assessment.  One major area of focus is dementia.

Through the Center, the growing population of seniors is better able to navigate not only the Hartford HealthCare system, but Connecticut’s entire healthcare system and community-based support services.