Jim Pulman
Based on the current information about the home health care system, a lot of discussions are required to find a successful remedy to make the entire system a better and more effective one. It is required to identify the key themes and issues that are required for your future focus, analysis, and synthesis. Naturally, all discussion will provide some opinions and recommendations based on the structure and different sections of the framework and the home care services provided.
You will need to follow different primary as well as secondary approaches for your research in order to gain a better understanding of the entire home health care system.
- This will help you to follow your vision as per the framework.
- This will also help you to position your home-based health care services to drive progress.
Everything will be in accordance with the goals of the US health care system. Since most of the patients like to receive care and support in their homes, it is only high-quality home-based care that can support the primary objective of providing patient-centered health care.
Moreover, as home health care is comparatively a low-cost situation of care, it will also enable the patients to grapple the high cost of health care with these specific arrangements of care. The efficacy of home health will thereby support the patients as well as the health care providers.
Change is necessary
In spite of the alignment of the health care system with its key goals, it is essential for any home care agency to evolve. Change is very necessary to capture all the available opportunities that may stem from the health care industry and markets. To be more specific, the home health industry must:
- Improve the capabilities
- Treat higher acuity patients
- Provide broader care needs both in the home as well as to the community.
This means that the home health care agencies should provide a wide array of home-based care that is flexible and will seamlessly leverage the need and preferences of the patients. In order to achieve this, they must have a clearly defined and achievable vision.
Apart from that, the home health care agencies also need to advance and grab the new capabilities that will enable them to collaborate and coordinate with other health care providers. This will ensure that the patients receive appropriate and high-quality care irrespective of the location or setting.
The regulatory environment
In order to allow the home health agencies to accomplish this mandate of providing high quality and effective care which is a part of the ongoing reforms in the health care industry, the role of the regulatory environment cannot be overlooked.
- This regulatory environment of the ever-changing health care industry also needs to shift so that it can permit the agencies to perform with greater flexibility for providing health care and support in the homes as and when appropriate.
- It is also required to create a variety of new and alternative health care delivery models. This will provide the right incentives to the health care industries for better use of home health and home-based care.
However, additional flexibility does not mean creating home-based care methods at random. In fact, innovative ways should be created and deployed based on the needs and preferences of the patients.
Vision for future
The home health care agencies should have a clear vision for the future that will enable them to perfectly outline the capabilities and characteristics that are essential to support the wider use of home health care. In addition to that, it will also enable them to overcome most of the challenges that health care methods may pose and inhibit the larger and better use of proper home-based care.
When it comes to the Medicare context, the same vision for a better and bigger home-based care needs to understand the precise role and importance of the Medicare-certified home health agencies.
- This will help them to accomplish their goal of providing efficient and high-quality care to the beneficiaries even more in the home as well as in the community on the whole.
- It will also help them to know and focus on the key roles and characteristics of the home health care agencies as they are by no means the only participant in this broad vision.
This is ideally the first revolutionary step to be taken by the Medicare home health agencies of this day and age.
Needs of the community referred beneficiaries
One of the most significant roles of the home health care agencies is to understand the needs of the community referred beneficiaries. It is noticed that at present the care and composition needs for such beneficiaries of Medicare home health care are not clear. It is for this reason that the participants vary on how to characterize these beneficiaries.
Few of them states that:
- The number of episodes covered by Part B is more
- It is more indicative of the fact and issue that the United States does not have any coverage for long term care and
- In most cases, the benefit acts as a long term care benefit itself.
Those who represent the caregivers and patients, however, emphasize the fact that the eligible patients in most of the time face trouble in accessing these specific benefits for the length of the time that they would profit from home health episodes.
For example, the physicians may be sometimes resistant to recertify home health episodes for those patients not requiring any post-acute care. It is during these times the other practitioners also may not recognize their eligibility for the benefit. This can be a real issue to specific patient populations such as those suffering from dementia.
In such situations, experts suggest that the Part B population is the area where reforms are required to make the most use of the opportunities provided by the innovation. In short, the home health agencies must make a change in their mindset and adapt to the changes made to Medicare payment and delivery.
