Aftercare
As a follow-up is known in the medicine the scheduled follow-up of patients after a completed or provisionally closed treatment. The goal of aftercare is:
- the recurrence of the disease or
- recognize typical complications of a disease or its treatment at an early stage and thus treat them more effectively,
- to support the patient in dealing with the disease in everyday life,
- to adapt long-term treatment to the needs of the patient and the course of the disease.
While many complex therapies (e.g. operations, chemotherapy ) are carried out in hospitals or in specialized centers, follow-up care is usually carried out close to home, often by the family doctor ; However, it can also include individual appointments in the hospital, possibly with more complex examinations such as imaging procedures , cardiac catheters or the like. Follow-up care can extend over weeks, months or years, depending on the disease.
Typical areas in which scheduled aftercare are carried out are:
- Tumor diseases and leukemias and their treatment. The focus of follow-up care here is on the early detection of tumor recurrences , monitoring of the consequences of therapy such as blood formation disorders , but also psychological support after interventional operations such as mastectomy.
- Implantation of pacemakers or ICD . The contact between the electrodes and the heart muscle (perception of the heart's actions and stimulus threshold of the pacemaker impulses) is measured and the charge level of the battery is checked. Modern pacemaker systems also offer many options for recording peculiarities of the heart rhythm and adapting the pacemaker activity to the needs of the patient.
- Mental disorders (e.g. depression ). Follow-up care takes place shortly after the completed medical rehabilitation service and serves to further stabilize the rehabilitation goals achieved.
- After an accident at work , a follow-up examination can be useful in order to assess the lasting consequences of the accident that are subject to compensation.
Following an inpatient or full-day outpatient service for medical rehabilitation, rehabilitation patients should be able to stabilize and develop the compensation strategies and behavior changes that they learned in rehabilitation in everyday life through aftercare. From 2016, a new framework concept for rehabilitation aftercare will apply in the statutory pension insurance. Tele-rehab aftercare has been available since 2017 .
Individual evidence
- ^ German pension insurance, aftercare, accessed on November 13, 2017 ( [1] ) /
- ↑ Framework concept for rehabilitation aftercare of the German Pension Insurance, accessed on July 16, 2018 ( [2] ) /
- ↑ Requirements of the German pension insurance for tele-rehabilitation aftercare, accessed on July 16, 2018 ( archived copy ( memento of the original of July 16, 2018 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and not yet checked. Please check the original - and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this note. ) /
