More than 20 million people 65 years and older present to emergency departments each year in the United States. Roughly one third of those patients are admitted to the hospital often because they cannot be safely discharged to their home. For an older patient, hospitalization comes with the increased risk of infection, falls, delirium, functional decline and death. Hospitalizations also come with increased cost to the patient, provider and payer. According to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), the average cost of an inpatient hospital stay is more than $13,800 per Medicare beneficiary.