The COVID-19 pandemic supercharged in-home care in the U.S. Suddenly it became possible to get a house call from a primary care provider; home-based physical therapy, dialysis, or an infusion of medicine; even a full complement of hospital-level services at home became possible. And Americans overwhelmingly liked it. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services…
One major challenge in the U.S. has been that healthcare funding and incentives have not included resources to address the social causes of health inequities. This has perpetuated the problem. Conversely, several European countries have combined funding for health and social services and created incentives for communities and organizations to address both areas collectively. Over…
A leader from PACE program Summit Eldercare believes there should be at least half the number of nursing homes in the country, in order to adequately provide value-based care. Instead, prospective SNF residents would be better served in community housing options. This is coupled with a trend Summit Eldercare is seeing among the SNFs it…
CMS has released the proposed rule for the Home Health Prospective Payment System next year. The rule seeks to expand the Home Health Value-Based Purchasing (HHVBP) Model and address health equity across different groups of beneficiaries. The rule released earlier today proposes to expand the HHVBP Model nationwide to shift home health Medicare reimbursement based…
To reduce redundancies and confusion in the Medicare system, health care policymakers should consider implementing “a smaller, more harmonized” portfolio of alternative payment models (APMs). That’s according to the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission (MedPAC), which released its regular June report to Congress on Tuesday. “In many cases, providers participate in multiple [alternative payment models] simultaneously,…
In the state of New York alone, patients being discharged from hospitals into a post-acute care (PAC) settings can choose from more than 620 nursing homes, 120 certified home health agencies and 1,400 licensed home care services agencies. A similar breadth of PAC options exist in many other U.S. markets as well. The emergence of accountable care…
Today, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) proposed significant changes to the Home Health Prospective Payment System to strengthen and modernize Medicare, drive value, and focus on individual patient needs rather than volume of care. Specifically, CMS is proposing changes to improve access to solutions via remote patient monitoring technology, and to update…
Home health agencies may soon be able to include the costs associated with remote patient monitoring into Medicare reimbursement. Under a proposed payment rule (PDF) released by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) on Monday, home health providers would be able to include the costs of remote patient monitoring as an allowable cost in…