News and Market Developments
Home Health Care News: GuideWell Announces Strategic Investment in Home-Based Primary Care Provider PopHealthCare (6/16) – Health plans — and the entities that own them — continue to invest heavily around in-home care. The latest example is GuideWell Mutual Holding Corporation, which announced a new “multi-year strategic investment” in subsidiary PopHealthCare on Wednesday. The company is not disclosing the exact size of the investment. “At GuideWell, we are committed to transforming health care and finding new and better ways to provide quality, personalized and affordable health care to our members where they are,” Pat Geraghty, president and CEO of GuideWell, said in a press release.
McKnight's Senior Living: Why value-based care will work in the home (6/15) – The countless efforts to reform healthcare in the United States have been around as long as the healthcare system itself, and they’ve all essentially shared a common goal — creating order out of chaos. Pick your metaphor — a hydra-headed monster, a five-alarm fire, a runaway train — the U.S. healthcare system has taxed the imagination and the desire to improve the quality of care while reducing cost. The road to reform has been paved with the carcasses of good intentions. But in healthcare’s continuum of change, there are approaches emerging whose progress excites the possibilities for progress. Value-based care (VBC) and home-based post-acute care (PAC) and preventative care have the potential to unite around a common cause, solving for a demographic boom that threatens the health of healthcare.
Fierce Healthcare: Humana to acquire onehome in bid to expand value-based home care (6/14) – Humana will acquire One Homecare Solutions, or onehome, in a bid to grow its value-based home healthcare offerings. The insurer announced Monday that it would purchase onehome from WayPoint Capital Partners in a deal expected to close in the second quarter of this year. Financial details were not disclosed, but Humana does not expect the acquisition to have a material impact on its 2021 earnings. The home health company has provided care to Humana members since 2015 and has pioneered a value-based model in both Texas and Florida. Humana said that onehome's platform brings a variety of home-based services into the fold, as well as that it serves as a care and risk manager.
Skilled Nursing News: SNFs Shouldn't Fight Rise of Home-Based Care (6/8) – Some nursing home operators may fear the push towards home-based care as direct competition, with their facilities still recovering from low occupancy rates caused by the pandemic. However, alternatives to traditional models — such as, Castell Health’s hospital-at-home program, which started in May 2020 and has admitted about 240 patients to date — have been shown to improve quality, lower costs, and boost patient satisfaction. “In our experience, our costs are about 30% cheaper than the hospital alternative and the pandemic really exploited or accelerated the hospital-at-home model. A recent study suggests that three out of five seniors prefer to receive care in their home,” Christine Lipson, director of Home Services for Castell Health, said at The Synergy Summit 2021, sponsored by Synergy HCA and SRX.
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