Experts in Home Health Give Thoughts and Advice for 2018 - Part 5

Previously, in Part IV of Experts in Home Health Give Thoughts and Advice for 2018, Arnie Cisneros and Kimberly McCormick from Home Health Strategic Management covered their ideas surrounding the approach to value-based care. As we continue with our series, Michael McGowan, OperaCare president, lends his thoughts surrounding how new regulation and compliance requirements for agencies might shift their approach to patient care.

Compliance and Quality Equal Growth and Profit

Regulatory and compliance updates simultaneously left nine states in the nation faced with new CoP’s (conditions of participation) and new COP’s (conditions of payment). These changes mandate re-engineering the delivery of patient care while competing with each other over cost of care, quality and outcomes.

Failure to innovate and diversify competitively produced the predictable downfall and Home Health Value-Based Purchasing (HHVBP) payment penalty for those who did not.  Those who failed to adapt to programs such as STARS, HHVBP, or prepare to participate in the alternative payment models where CMS states 80 percent of the payments will come from in the near future still have a chance. But not for long.

If you’re in the top 10 percent of the penalty group, your situation is very hopeful as evidenced by providers in the acute care arena. If you’re in the bonus group, and near the top 10 percent, you have a target on your back. Cost, quality and outcomes are the new currency of home care. Innovation and re-engineering the continuum of patient care to be data-driven is the only way to realize efficiency, predictability and profitability, assuring your future with CMS.

See you next time for Experts in Home Health Give Thoughts and Advice for 2018 – Part VI where we’ll hear from Home Care Sales’ Melanie Stover as she explores how referral partnerships are poised to transform the home health landscape for 2018.