Century Tree Health Education

155 Water Street
Brooklyn NY 11201

mike@centurytree.net
1 (718) 755-9384

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Videos

Get to know us

Take a look at how we reach caregivers and patients. 

Disease management isn’t just about pills and medical procedures.  It doesn’t happen without the home health aides, family members and patients who fight, every single day, against illness, suffering and loneliness.  Century Tree teaches sophisticated topics-- like patient care techniques and disease process— while meeting the learning needs of the people who know about the realities of struggling with chronic disease better than anyone:

  • Straightforward explanations
  • Easy-to-see pictures (not hard-to-read text)
  • And ALWAYS with celebration of our courageous,compassionate caregivers and patients
STORIES OF
CARING
Acts of Grace
LEARNING...AND
LAUGHING...
Don't Suffer
Use the Puffer
TEACHING
DISEASE MANAGMENT
Take care of
Those Swollen legs
TEACHING WITH
GRAPHIC STORIES
Bahala Na
A CHF Feature
CELEBRATING CAREGIVERS…
Kindness & Respect
PEOPLE
REACHING PEOPLE
For Those Among Us
OUR GOALS

Century Tree’s Goals:

Reduce patient suffering

There are two areas of at-home disease management that dramatically impact patient stability:

  • Medication adherence— keeps patients stable and safe
  • Prompt recognition of disease-specific warning signs, coupled with immediate communication with doctors to facilitate quick intervention (usually a temporary medication adjustment)— stopping acute episodes from growing worse, preventing hospitalizations

Keeping your patient at “baseline” with:

  • Medication adherence and management
  • “Hands on care,” including compression stockings, wound care and daily foot and skin inspections
  • Coordination of primary and specialist care, outpatient procedures and therapies

Prevent hospitalizations

Even with the most diligent disease management, advanced CHF, type 2 diabetes, COPD and Alzheimer’s dementia patients have acute episodes that can require hospitalization.

There are two areas of at-home disease management that dramatically impact patient stability:

  • Medication adherence— keeps patients stable and safe
  • Prompt recognition of disease-specific warning signs, coupled with immediate communication with doctors to facilitate quick intervention (usually a temporary medication adjustment)— stopping acute episodes from growing worse, preventing hospitalizations
  • CHF and COPD patients develop acute dyspnea, struggling for every breath; diabetics develop foot callouses and bunions that can lead to amputations, and; Alzheimer’s sufferers are prone to bouts of confusion and accidents associated with episodes of acute cognitive decline.
  • Century Tree videos and web content teach caregivers to recognize disease-specific problems early, when they can be treated, with temporary medication adjustments or outpatient procedures— before the patient needs to go to the hospital.

Decrease costs of care

There are two areas of at-home disease management that dramatically impact patient stability:

  • Medication adherence— keeps patients stable and safe
  • Prompt recognition of disease-specific warning signs, coupled with immediate communication with doctors to facilitate quick intervention (usually a temporary medication adjustment)— stopping acute episodes from growing worse, preventing hospitalizations
  • Preventing hospitalizations, with medication adherence and daily vigilance for warning signs, is the single most effective way of controlling American healthcare costs.  Before recent spikes in the cost of medications, 76% of the $325 billion spent annually on CHF, type II diabetes and COPD treatment annually went toward one form of care: hospitalizations.  A typical late or end stage chronic disease patient consumed $78,000 in healthcare spending every year, with more than $67,000 of those dollars going toward hospital costs.

Compassionate decisions for end-of-life care

There are two areas of at-home disease management that dramatically impact patient stability:

  • Medication adherence— keeps patients stable and safe
  • Prompt recognition of disease-specific warning signs, coupled with immediate communication with doctors to facilitate quick intervention (usually a temporary medication adjustment)— stopping acute episodes from growing worse, preventing hospitalizations
  • Accelerated Treatment-- As patients’ lives draw to a close, both the intensity and cost of care often accelerated even more.  Patients are frequently hospitalized, where expensive treatments and diagnostic procedures, costing tens of thousands of dollars each, are routinely performed every day.  Statistically, these interventions too often offer patients pain without benefit.  End stage chronic disease patients who receive “heroic” treatments in the hospital don’t live any longer or healthier—they just suffer more.   And those treatments are expensive— costing as much as $1,000,000 over the course of the final 2 to 3 years of patients’ lives.
  • Compassionate decisions-- The problem is that treatment can be difficult to refuse, especially if decisions are made without genuine contemplation in advance.  No one wants to be the one who said “No” to a procedure the day before their parent or spouse dies.    
    From the first time a caregiver visits The CareGiver’s Encyclopedia,  Century Tree encourages them to start thinking about end of life care.   With this advance contemplation caregivers and patients can safely make the sorts of difficult decisions that will prevent future suffering and allow for decisions that are right for themselves, their family and their loved one.

Caregiving... an every day job

Keeping Patients Healty/Reducing suffering

For a patient with an advanced chronic disease, each new day brings no guarantees.  The key to advanced chronic disease management is maintaining stability, or the patient’s “baseline.”

Learn More
our community

being a part of the century tree community

Nostalgia • Videos • Forums • Activities • Connection

"Yes. There's a LOT of videos and Pictures. Our content is made for non readers. Patients & caregivers from different cultures and different parts of the country"
John Freeman — Artistic Director

Caregiving for someone with a serious disease is a profoundly personal experience reflecting our deepest beliefs about :

  • Compassion
  • Responsibility
  • Faith
  • Our loved ones, and ourselves

Century Tree content reaches caregivers "where they live," exploring each of the many dimensions of caregiving from the practical to the personal, and the funny stuff

Scripts & Pics examples

Teaching About disease with simple easy-to-understand words & pictures

DM2 Overviews & DM2 Coping Measures

DM2 Neuropathy

DM2 Overviews & DM2 Coping Measures

CHF - Overviews & DM2 Coping Measures

CHF scrip and pic story 01

CHF scrip and pic story 02

COPD Overviews & DM2 Coping Measures

COPD scrip and pic story 01

COPD scrip and pic story 02

ALZ Overviews & Coping Measures

ALZ scrip and pic story 01

ALZ scrip and pic story 02

For Doctors & Nurses

Scripts & pictures for patients & caregivers about disease management

When describing chronic diseases to patients,
it is often easier to show them visually in an immersive way to
help them to understand the complex ideas
that are being described to them

TEACHING DISEASE MANAGEMENT

&
CHF

STORIES OF CARING

&
CHF

LEARNING...AND
LAUGHING... WITH

&
CHF

TEACHING WITH
GRAPHIC STORIES

&
CHF

FOR CAREGIVING
WOMEN

&
CHF

Personalities

&
CHF