Nursing in the Home
There are no universal standards for how many hours per day of nursing care a ventilator-dependent child must receive in the home; however, the American Thoracic Society (ATS) has developed guidelines for home nursing cov-erage based on national research and expert opinion. These guidelines for the home care of the child with a tracheostomy have been ad-opted as a standard by most children’s hospitals to successfully transition children from the hos-pital to home. “All children should receive skilled home nursing care during a transitional adjust-ment time after discharge. The duration and daily extent of this care must be prescribed by the physician on an individual basis, with peri-odic reassessment by members of the tertiary care center team. Many children will have an ongoing need for skilled nursing care and this reassessment will provide information as to the
need to increase or decrease the level of skilled