News and Market Developments
Healthcare IT News: St. Luke's Finds Success with its Hospital In Your Home Program (3/16) - St. Luke's Health System, an 11-hospital network based in Kansas City, Missouri, initiated its Hospital In Your Home care model in July 2022 to reduce costs, improve outcomes and enhance the patient experience. Patient satisfaction has been up 18% for those using the virtual care program compared with those hospitalized in a bricks-and-mortar facility, with many feeling more empowered to manage their conditions.
Modern Healthcare: General Catalyst Launches At-Home Startup Amid Economic Uncertainty (3/15) - General Catalyst is launching a digital health startup with a $25 million investment focused on at-home care. The startup, called Maribel, will be led by former Mission Health CEO Dr. Ron Paulus and former Bayada Home Healthcare Chief Medical Officer Dr. Adam Groff. Maribel will provide a tech platform and advisory services to health systems offering complex care services in the home. Maribel will be paid largely through performance-based clinical and financial outcomes within these at-home care programs.
PR Newswire: Forcura Partners with AlayaCare to Support the Entire Home-based Care Market (3/14) - Forcura, a health care technology company, and AlayaCare, a developer of end-to-end home-based care technology, announced a partnership that will offer AlayaCare customers the ability to utilize Forcura’s health care workflow management platform as an integrated solution. Since its founding in 2012, Forcura and its technology innovations have supported agencies and providers across the home-based care sector in a variety of ways. This strategic partnership marks Forcura’s second integration with an electronic health record (EHR) platform in the home care market, which was valued at $94.17 billion in 2022 as all aspects of home-based care continues to grow nationwide. It represents the company’s seventh integration with an EHR in post-acute healthcare.
Home Health Care News: Enhabit ‘Having Quicker Success’ Contracting With Regional Medicare Advantage Plans (3/14) - In order to manage its home health visits appropriately, Enhabit Inc. hopes to have anywhere from 0 percent to 10 percent fee-for-service discounts when negotiating managed care episodic contracts. Enhabit realized that it not only had to increase the number of managed care contracts on its books, but it had to improve the quality of those contracts. The plan is paying off so far. Enhabit has negotiated 18 regional contracts, nine of which are active with seven of those being paid at an episodic rate with that 0 percent to 10 percent discount.
Home Health Care News: Transactions: Help at Home’s Latest Acquisition; Prospero Rolls Into Landmark Health Under Optum (3/13) - Help at Home announced it has agreed to agreed to acquire Prosper Home Care, a home care provider based in Atlanta. Adding Prosper Home Care to the Help at Home family brings together the two organizations to address the growing need from seniors and must-serve populations to age in place as safely and as independently as possible in their homes. Help at Home’s network includes 180 branch locations across 12 states. The acquisition of Prosper Home Care will “add scale and depth” in another core market, which is in line with the company’s growth strategy. For additional coverage, see McKnights Home Care.
McKnights Home Care: Peer-to-Peer: Former Audiologist Becomes Chief Growth Officer of Right at Home (3/8) - Brady Schwab, the new chief growth officer of Right at Home, comes to his role with a fresh set of eyes — or ears, as the case may be. The former audiologist cut his professional teeth in hearing healthcare. As he embarks on his mission to grow the 600-plus-unit home care franchise, he draws on his experience in working with seniors and building out businesses. He talked more to McKnight’s Home Care Daily Pulse about where he sees the future for Right at Home.
Business Wire: Cue Health’s New Suite of At-Home Diagnostic Tests and Expansion of Cue Care Puts You in Control of Your Health (3/13) - Cue Health, a health care technology company, announced the nationwide launch of a new suite of consumer-friendly, at-home diagnostic test kits. These easy-to-use kits provide individuals with access to accurate, reliable testing from the comfort of their own homes, making it easier for people to take control of their health. The tests are integrated into Cue Care – the company’s innovative test-to-treat service. Cue provides personalized care and access to convenient treatment, including e-prescriptions and medication delivery, from the privacy of home.
Healthcare IT News: Using RPM to Manage Customized Specialty Care Between Office Visits (3/13) - Remote patient monitoring technology meets patients where they prefer to be – at home. Monitoring in between the traditional office visit reduces the potential severity of health outcomes. With almost 50 percent of medical groups reporting no-show rates increasing since 2019, providers can collect meaningful health insights without the patient taking time – often away from work – to travel to the office.
Home Care Association of New York State: New Video Series Shows Positive Impact of Hospitals and Home Care Collaboration on Patient Care (3/13) - The transformative effect of hospital and home care collaboration on patient care is made clear in a new video series developed by the Home Care Association of New York State, Iroquois Healthcare Association and the Healthcare Association of New York State. Produced as part of the Statewide Hospital-Home Care Collaborative for COVID-19 and Beyond, funded by the Mother Cabrini Health Foundation, these videos show how hospitals and home care providers from across the state are working together in a coordinated fashion to provide high quality, patient-centered care.
Home Health Care News: Inside The States Where Home-Based Care Providers May Be Paying More For Labor (3/13) - California, Minnesota and New York are among some of the states where home-based care providers are seeing the cost of employing caregivers and clinicians increase. At the start of 2023, at least 23 states increased their minimum hourly wages as part of their “fight for $15” efforts or to adjust for cost-of-living inflation. The increases, the Economic Policy Institute estimates, equate to over $5 billion in pay bumps for several million workers.
Home Health Care News: How Data Can Help Home-Based Care Providers Zero In On Growth Opportunities (3/10) - Home-based care providers, and others in the post-acute care space, need to start collecting the right kind of data in order to get quality outcomes and reach growth targets. Collecting and using data can be an overwhelming process for home-based care providers. That’s especially true when it seems like the rules and regulations change on a yearly basis. Having a better grasp on data collection can also be used as a recruitment and retention tool when dealing with staffing shortages.
UC Davis: Patients Receive Infusion Care from the Comfort of Their Home (3/9) - Home infusion for UC Davis Health patients was merely an idea two years ago. Today, the program consists of a robust team – 11 members to be exact – including home infusion nurses, clinical pharmacists, pharmacy technician navigators and administrators. Currently, most home infusion medications are for patients with gastrointestinal diseases. Within the next couple of months, however, the team plans to expand its services to other outpatient specialties such as genetics, neurology, immunology, rheumatology, and pulmonology.
McKnights Home Care: Provider Groups Explore Collaboration (3/9) - The National Association for Home Care & Hospice and the National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization announced they have formed a joint exploratory committee to determine how the two organizations can better collaborate and partner on issues. The organizations have retained association consulting firm McKinley Advisors to help provide an analysis of potential ways the two associations can strengthen ties. McKinley will be conducting interviews with industry stakeholders over the next several weeks and report its findings with recommendations to the boards of both NAHC and NHPCO. The groups hope to have that report in hand with next steps sometime in May.
Home Health Care News: Home-Based Care Providers Still Hesitant On Idea Of ‘Workforce Sharing' (3/8) - On the surface, the idea of workforce sharing seems like a promising one for home-based care providers. There’s the flexibility and convenience it offers, coupled with staffing shortages felt across the space. But some provider leaders are hesitant – for a number of reasons, such as rotating clinicians in and out of a patient’s routine care schedule.
Hospice News: Prospero Health to Merge with Landmark within UnitedHealth Group’s Optum (3/8) - Home-based care provider Prospero Health is merging with Landmark Health. Both Landmark and Prospero are major palliative care providers in addition to their other medical services. The Prospero-Landmark merger comes on the heels of UnitedHealth Group’s $5.4 billion purchase of the home health and hospice giant LHC Group.
Home Health Care News: Home Care Companies Are Making Unique Acquisitions To Diversify Revenue, Differentiate Themselves (3/7) - In an attempt to branch out, more personal home care agencies are looking to acquire companies in other sectors. Those additions, the companies believe, will allow them to unlock opportunities and stand out among their peers.
Becker's Hospital Review: Signify Health to Offer Home-Based Medical Management Services (3/6) - Home health company Signify Health has partnered with Cardinal Health to offer home-based clinical and medication management services to patients. Under the partnership, Cardinal's OutcomesOne clinical care platform will offer coordinated care from Signify Health clinicians to perform evaluations of health plan members in the home to address any medication management challenges. The partnership will focus on addressing interventions recommended for Medicare Advantage members. For additional coverage, see Home Health Care News.
Home Health Care News: Why Home Health Providers Could Become Primary Drivers Of Hospital At Home (3/6) - One of the most intriguing story lines in home-based care over the next year will be whether home health providers can successfully make themselves an integral part of hospital-at-home care in the U.S. In 2023, over half of home-based care organizations plan to pursue higher-acuity care in the home for the first time, specifically meaning hospital-at-home or SNF-at-home care. For home health providers to become the primary drivers of hospital at home, that would also require a willingness to do so.
McKnights Home Care: Best Buy, Walmart Move to Provide More Care in Home Services for Seniors (3/6) - Two retailers took steps last week to capitalize on the growing home and senior care markets. Walmart disclosed it is expanding Walmart Health locations to two new states. Best Buy said it signed a three-year agreement with Advocate Health, enabling it to capitalize on the health system’s hospital-at-home business.
McKnights Home Care: Parkinson’s Foundation Aims to Improve Disease Awareness with Membership Program (3/6) - The Parkinson’s Foundation launched its Community Partners in Parkinson’s Care membership program for home care agencies and senior living communities. There is an online curriculum with four learning modules, which provide guidance and training for treating patients with Parkinson’s. Members must also pay an annual fee of $2,500. Per Wichmann, familiarity with the disease is imperative in order to administer the proper care.
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