Attention all discharge planners. I need an honest opinion

Hello from Alabama. We in the Case Management Department of our 440 bed hospital all have the title of Case Manager. We are RN's, one LPN, and Social Workers. There are a group of RN's that are Clinical Documentation Specialists, and that is all they do. The LPN and the Social Workers do discharge planning. The RN's do discharge planning and utilization management. We are separated in our "area of expertise" so to speak, either doing discharge planning or utilization management. I dislike discharge planning with a passion for all the reasons listed in previous posts, but really love doing utilization management, and ususally that's all I do. Sometimes, of course, the discharge planners are swamped and I help them out. We usually have staff meetings once a month, but can have more if we need to get together and talk about things like difficult discharges, etc. We have been looking for a web site that case managers can get together on and "compare notes". Unable to find one I lauched a site called CaseManagerTalk.com. It is a free web site where case managers (either medical facility or insurance company) can exchange information, post their personal stories, post important information and updates, and there's even a chat room. It is a new site, so I haven't had many visitors. Please come and check us out...and sign the guest book.
Thanks

Thank you , I shall visit. Doing utilization just about the majority of my nursing career, and very good at it. But when I worked in this particular for profit facility as a case manager, I was so flabergasted due to the lack of proper orientation, lack of proper division of staff, lack of equipment ( some have no computer to work before or after the day. I did not even have my own phone to do my business,) and I felt embarrassed when floor staff have to drop what they are doing to give me the msg in the back room...the worse part of this is the incoming supervisor had no organization , she did not give priority to the equipment needed by the CM...instead she is so busy making more forms to fill, as though we did not have enough paper work. some are duplicates of what the hospital already have. She required a "report" each day ........I find this micromanaging , of which is devastating in this area and specialty. Aside form this , there is also a report once a week w/ the staff & physicians of patients that are overstaying......noted most of this patients were medicaid and some patients do not really have a home to go home to, and medicaid or medical pays minimal of which makes it even more intense. I truly feel that admission should be able to catch this "complex" admission and a social worker assigned to these patients from the beginning since there is a big placement issue , and not later.
It sounded that your facility is quite organized, hearing about the divisions and so on.....it makes a big difference if the system is in place and a good supervisor that helps her staff instead of making it more complex! A big diference !!!!