2008 News and Events

Press Releases

2008 Community Events

Community Conversations
Thursday, January 17, 2008
5:30 to 9 p.m.
University of Rochester Medical Center
Arthur Kornberg Medical Research Building - LeChase Auditorium
601 Elmwood Avenue., Rochester, NY

St. Ann's Community and Visiting Nurse Service of Rochester and Monroe County, Inc. present the first in a series of Community Conversations. To register and reserve your seat, please complete this form.

Town Mayors and Supervisors learn about meal preparation and delivery at this year's Mayor's for Meals.

Prepare Rochester's finest meals with The Tastes of the Town Cookbook The Tastes of the Town Cookbook features the favorite recipes of restaurants, caterers, and bakeries all over Monroe County (including many participants of The Taste of Pittsford). Enjoy recipes from the area's finest restaurants and caterers, including: The Rio Bamba Cutler's Grand Finales Dessert Catering Hawthorne's Le Petite Bistro Max of Eastman Place Dakota Grill El Mundo Grill Pearl The Distillery Crystal Barn Dinosaur Bar-B-Que Biaggi's Mario via Abruzzi and many more You'll find such favorites as:

• Brio's Spaghetti Gamberetti
• The Lodge at Woodcliff's Candied BBQ Sauce
• Green Lantern Inn's Citrus and Marinated Shrimp
• Martini Grill's Lambchops Lay-Belle
• and many, many more!

The book will make a great Holiday gift for $14.99 plus shipping/handling. All proceeds benefit Meals On Wheels.

To reserve your copy, send in the completed order form, or call 787-2233.

VNS Update - Designed especially for our Physicians and Allied Health Care Professionals

VNS Creating Premier Programs
We’re proud to offer Rochester’s most comprehensive range of home health care services, keeping your patients healthy and independent at home. We’re building upon the strengths of five existing programs, making enhancements that will lead to the creation of Premier Programs. These programs – Cardiac, Cancer, Hospice, Long Term Care and Meals On Wheels – feature efficient referral processes, good communication and high quality outcomes that exceed state and national benchmarks.

Our highly trained and experienced Cardiac Team nurses are available 24 hours a day to assess chest pain, heart and lung sounds, respiratory difficulties, and wounds, while providing vital physician-ordered care. Through standardized educational programs, we teach your patients ‘healthy heart living’, including important self-care following cardiac procedures and surgeries, and information about the drugs that have been prescribed.

Designed to meet the complex needs of your patients with potentially life threatening illnesses, our Palliative Care Program benefits those with uncontrolled symptoms like pain or nausea. Our team works closely with the family and physician to develop individualized home care plans based on the stage and severity of illness, meeting medical, psychosocial and spiritual needs of patients. Services include: case management by an RN with advanced training in acute and palliative care; symptom management; certified chemotherapy nurses available for in-home consultation and administration; maintenance of central line devices and infusion administration; and wound care and ostomy management by a board certified nurse.

Our Hospice Staff supports the difficult decisions patients need to make regarding the pursuit of medical treatment with a high level of sensitivity around the emotional needs of patients and their families. Hospice case managers work closely with you to ensure that symptom and pain relief is at the center of care. Eventually, the focus shifts to the process of dying, with emphasis on end-of-life decision making and achieving a death that is consistent with the values and expressed desires of the patient.

Patients in need of ongoing health care are able to maintain independence in their home through our Long Term Home Health Care program. Our team of professional, experienced caregivers provides a positive alternative to institutionalization for people of all ages who are disabled or chronically ill. Monroe County residents covered by Medicaid who are medically eligible for nursing home level of care, either skilled or health related, are eligible. Approval must be made by a physician to ensure that the patient can be safely cared for at home, based on a complete health, social and available environmental assessment. Clinical services nursing, aide care, therapies, social work and nutritional counseling; additional support services like Meals On Wheels, Personal Emergency Response System, home maintenance and improvement, housekeeping/heavy chores, social day care and transportation are also provided.

Meals On Wheels has been serving the nutritional needs of the frail, ill, elderly and homebound in our community for 50 years. In collaboration with the American Red Cross, the program serves more than 330,000 meals to area residents each year. Besides delivering nutritious meals, Meals On Wheels helps clients remain independent and provides peace of mind for family members who can't be with their loved ones every day.

Introducing the Konica Minolta/Air-Shields JM-103 Jaundice Meter The VNS Pediatric Program now offers bilirubin screening of newborns through use of the lightweight, handheld, noninvasive Konica Minolta/Air-Shields JM-103 Jaundice Meter.

After receiving numerous requests from physicians to have this technology available –and thanks to a grant from Ronald McDonald House Charities–we are now able to offer this technology to you.

The compact meter allows a quick estimate of bilirubin concentration in the tissues in the first two weeks of life, and is used as a screening tool only to identify need for further laboratory blood serum TSB testing or clinical considerations in the jaundiced newborn. Transcutaneous bilirubin level testing will be done with a physician order and done as part of the VNS skilled nursing visit/assessment of the newborn. There is no additional cost. You will be notified of the results the same day. For more information on the meter and VNS Pediatric Program services, please call Anne Strasser, 787-8763.

To make a referral, please call 787-8338, or speak with one of our home care coordinators at the hospitals.

Telehealth Focus: CHF, COPD, Diabetes, Hypertension Our Telehealth Program – the Health Buddy – is expanding! When we initially introduced this program to our CHF patients, we already had some of the lowest emergent care and hospitalization rates in the nation for home care agencies; yet, we were able to improve upon those rates by adding another component of patient monitoring through the Health Buddy. With the use of this portable, in-home device our CHF home care patients enjoyed a 28% reduction in emergent care use and a 27% reduction in hospitalization compared to our CHF patients not on the Health Buddy in 2007.

Based on this success, we’ve expanded the program to include two additional high-risk groups: the Diabetic and COPD populations. In addition to vital signs and weight monitoring, our COPD patients are given an oximeter, having all these values monitored, as well as how they answer symptom questions. Patients also receive education on their disease process, and self-care management skills are promoted. Diabetics are able to enter a number of blood glucose readings that enable us to better trend and evaluate glycemic control.

We have a dedicated telehealth nurse that reviews results daily and works closely with the home care team to maximize patient outcomes. The telehealth nurse also sends graphic reports to the physician biweekly so that you can see trends quickly.

And of course, the Health Buddy is an excellent tool for the management of the hypertensive patient during drug titration.