A Senate floor hearing is up next for legislation that would require hospitals to adopt and maintain discharge policies to ensure patients receive necessary care after leaving the hospital.

Senate Bill 2397, the Caregiver Advise Record and Enable Act, cleared the Senate Judiciary and Human Services committees Tuesday on unanimous votes.

The American Association of Retired Persons is pushing for CARE Act legislation to be adopted nationwide to streamline the elderly discharge process by preparing families, friends and other caretakers for the long-term care of older patients.

According to testimony in support of the bill from Gerry Silva, president of AARP Hawaii, 18 states already have similar laws and 20 are currently debating adopting them.

Hawaii had the highest percentage of people 85 and older in 2012 — and that population is expected to increase by 65 percent in the next 20 years, according to the bill.

In 2013, an AARP study showed the state had 154,000 family caregivers who provided free services worth $2.1 billion.

Under the CARE Act, each hospital would allow elderly patients to identify a caregiver, who would have a chance to be involved in the discharge planning process. Prior to discharge, caretakers would have the opportunity to learn about a patient’s specific needs and be taught how to provide after-hospital services.

Upon discharge or transfer to another facility, the hospital would be required to notify patients’ caretakers. If they cannot be reached, the hospital could proceed with the discharge.

The hospital would not be liable for any mistakes made under a caretaker’s supervision, and a patient’s consent would still be required to disclose any private health information to a caretaker.

The caretaker’s name and contact information would be kept in the patient’s electronic health record.

The state Department of Health testified in favor of the bill and said that in Hawaii, there are an estimated 90,000 annual discharges from 14 hospitals. The government proposed hospital discharge planning guidelines last year.

While written testimony was overwhelmingly in support of SB 2397, some people maintain the CARE Act may put pressure on those who aren’t adequately trained to care for their elderly loved ones.

Colette Browne, chair of the Gerontology Program at the University of Hawaii at Manoa’s Myron B. Thompson School of Social Work, said in testimony against the bill that as a caretaker of her 92-year-old mother and 69-year-old sister, she knew firsthand the challenges of communicating with health care professionals.

“From the family’s perspective, we come face-to-face with numerous and varied professionals who seem to use their own language and terminology, and rarely have time to talk with you about the patient’s diagnosis or prognosis,” she wrote.

Kathleen Kozak, an internal medicine physician at Straub Clinic and Hospital, said in a Civil Beat column that although the CARE Act has good intentions, the result would be that patients overall have a lower standard of care while at home than if insurance companies paid for professional care.