Follow-up Care

Follow-Up After Discharge

The day of your discharge, we call your personal physician and ask to schedule you a follow-up appointment or to call you. Usually, your physician will want to see you within one to two weeks.

How long will it take to get better?

There is no one answer to this question, but a good “rule of thumb” is that it takes you just as long to get better as your illness lasted up to your hospital release. In other words, if you had pneumonia and have been sick for two weeks prior to your hospital release, it is going to take you another two weeks before you feel like doing your regular activities again.

Most people feel a little bit better every day. Initially, you will need to sleep more than usual and will not have endurance for being out in the cold, reading for long periods of time, or taking care of a big family.

If you start feeling worse, the first thing to do is to get more rest. If rest doesn’t help, you should talk with your doctor or an advice nurse. Your worsening symptoms could mean a relapse of your original problem, a problem with one of your new medications, or a new problem.