Telehealth News and Market Developments
Modern Healthcare: CMS should collect home health telehealth data, experts say (9/3) – At the September Medicare Payment Advisory Commission (MedPAC) meeting, MedPAC commissioners discussed how CMS should collect data about telehealth use in home health to guide policymakers in setting reimbursement rates for providers. CMS adjusted how Medicare pays providers under the home health prospective payment system in 2020 after Congress mandated changes to those payments in the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2018. MedPAC tried to examine the impact of those changes on home health, finding a 20 percent decline in in-person visits last year, however it is unclear whether this was from the pandemic or the payment changes. While MedPAC will not recommend that CMS require home health providers to report their telehealth use, the commission may describe the benefits of such a requirement in its March 2022 report.
mHealth Intelligence: American Academy of Pediatrics Targets Parity in Telehealth Policy Statement (9/2) – The American Academy of Pediatrics issued a policy statement in the September issue of Pediatrics, calling for payment parity for telehealth and more efforts to address social determinants. The document, titled “Telehealth: Improving Access to and Quality of Pediatric Health Care,” contains eight recommendations, focusing primarily on ensuring equitable, quality care, payment reform and addressing barriers to access.
American Medical Association (AMA): Telehealth virtual visits can be a tool to fight climate change (9/1) – Researchers with Northwest Permanente (NWP) calculated telehealth’s impact on reducing patients’ vehicle traffic and the corresponding reduction in emissions. Ambulatory visit carbon intensity, a new metric that measures the total greenhouse gas emissions associated with a given outpatient visit, dropped by 51 percent. The article stated that, “Fewer miles driven, for example, also mean less wear and tear on public streets and fewer in-person patient visits allows for a reduction in health care’s footprint.”
Business Insider: Here’s how a Cleveland hospital is implementing a hybrid telehealth model during the ongoing pandemic (9/1) – MetroHealth, a community hospital in Cleveland, Ohio, quickly pivoted to telehealth during the pandemic to care for its diverse patient population, as well as a Hospital at Home program to free up inpatient beds. The health system has expanded these services to better reach for and care for its patient population, offering training and support to providers to help with the transition to a model that relied heavily on virtual care. Providers conducted about 480,000 telehealth visits in 2020 and 217,000 thus far in 2021.
JAMIA: Health management via telemedicine: Learning from the COVID-19 experience (8/30) – In a new Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association article, Stanford-affiliated researchers highlight the gaps they still see in telemedicine and the opportunities for growth beyond the COVID-19 crisis. “To optimize patient and provider experience through telemedicine, stakeholders need to focus on enhancing technology interoperability and usability and providing sufficient training for efficient telemedicine use. While in-person visits are essential in many conditions, telemedicine may be a viable alternative for certain patient populations and care needs.”
Home Health Care News: How CommonSpirit Reduced Medicare Spending by $136M (8/30) – As a MSSP participant, CommonSpirit has saved Medicare more than $200 million over the past three years. CommonSpirit has pulled it off by increasing annual wellness visits, improving the management of hypertension, enhancing care coordination and innovating its home-based care offerings, according to the press release.
JAMA Health Forum: Paying for Telemedicine in Smaller Rural Hospitals (8/27) – Researchers from Harvard Medical School penned a piece in JAMA about the limitations of financial gain from telehealth in rural hospitals. "While EDs can bill on behalf of clinicians, which would defray subscription costs, few do so because the administrative barriers of credentialing and licensure are prohibitive across multiple insurers, especially given the low volume of consultations and the amount of reimbursement per visit," the analysis said.
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