The Home Health Care Wire
Your source for CareVoyant and industry news. April 26, 2023
Work-Life Balance – A Guide to Home Care Workers
Home healthcare professionals and workers are some of the most dedicated, patient, and empathetic people. They provide care to patients under demanding conditions to age in place at their homes. However, demanding workloads and low wages have led many workers to leave home healthcare due to burnout. Providing the right balance between work and life will play a significant role in recruiting and retaining home care workers.
Achieving a healthy work-life balance is crucial for home healthcare professionals. The job demands can be physically and emotionally taxing, and home care workers must take care of themselves to provide the best possible care to their patients. To help home healthcare professionals strike a balance between their professional and personal responsibilities, it is crucial to establish clear guidelines and boundaries. This blog will discuss some of the guidelines that home healthcare professionals can follow to maintain a healthy work-life balance.
Home Care Agencies providing Home and Community-Based Services face many challenges in implementing EVV solutions to meet CURES Act requirements. Home Care Agencies should take a holistic approach in finding the right home care software partner to implement EVV rather the settling for the solutions provided by the state or managed care providers. Taking an integrated approach will improve operational efficiency and the agency's bottom line.
This blog will review the key factors Home Care Agencies should consider in selecting the right home care software to implement EVV in their agencies.
Even though Electronic Visit Verification (EVV) has been in use for a while, the 21st Century CURES Act mandated the use of EVV for Medicaid providers. The Cures Act initially required states to implement an EVV (Electronic Visit Verification) system by January 1, 2021, for Medicaid-funded Personal Care Services (PCS) and by January 1, 2023, for Home Health Care Services (HHCS) that require in-home visit by a provider. Many states received exemptions and deferred implementation of EVV for a year or two. As of January 1, 2023, nearly 80% of the states require EVV for Personal Care Services. Quite a few states also require EVV for Home Health Care Services (Skilled).
This blog will review EVV requirements and the steps Home Care Agencies should take to implement EVV in their agencies.
Home Healthcare Industry News
CMS To Publicly Release All Ownership Info Of Home Health, Hospice Agencies
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is making ownership data for all Medicare-certified home health and hospice agencies publicly available. Anyone can now review “detailed information on the ownership of more than 6,000 hospices and 11,000 home health agencies,” according to CMS. HHS is doing so in the name of “promoting competition” and “protecting consumers.”
CMS’ April OASIS-E Q&As address patient mood & high-risk drugs
CMS addresses the conflicting information given in the OASIS-E assessment versus the OASIS-E Guidance Manual for D0150 (Patient Mood Interview) in the April quarterly OASIS-E Q&As, released April 18.
Disregard the statement in the OASIS item that states if symptom frequency for either “D0150A2 (Little interest or pleasure in doing things) or D0150B2 (Feeling down, depressed or hopeless) is coded “2 — 7-11 days (half or more of the days)” or “3 — 12-14 days (nearly every day),” continue asking the questions below. If not, end the PHQ interview.” This statement is outdated due to refinements in OASIS guidance, CMS states.
HCBS Utilization Has Grown Significantly, But The Workforce Hasn’t
Workforce growth has not kept pace with the growth of utilization in home- and community-based services (HCBS), a new study found. From 2013 to 2019, the number of home care workers per 100 HCBS participants declined by 11.6%. Preliminary estimates suggest that a decline in that ratio continued post-2020.
Upcoming Events
Missouri Alliance for Home Care Annual Conference
Margaritaville Lake Resort, Osage Beach, MO - April 26-27
New England Home Care & Hospice Conference & Trade Show
DoubleTree, Manchester, NH - May 2-4
Pennsylvania Annual Conference
Hershey Lodge, Hershey, PA - May 14-16
ABOUT CAREVOYANT
CareVoyant is a leading provider of cloud-based integrated enterprise-scale home health care software that can support all home-based services under ONE Software, ONE Patient, and ONE Employee, making it a Single System of Record. We support all home based services, including Home Care, Private Duty Nursing, Private Duty Non-Medical, Home and Community Based Services (HCBS), Home Health, Pediatric Home Care, and Outpatient Therapy at Home.
CareVoyant functions – Intake, Authorization Management, Scheduling, Clinical with Mobile options, eMAR/eTAR, Electronic Visit Verification (EVV), Billing/AR, Secure Messaging, Notification, Reporting, and Dashboards – streamline workflow, meet regulatory requirements, improve quality of care, optimize reimbursement, improve operational efficiency and agency bottom line.
For more information, please visit CareVoyant.com or call us at 1-888-463-6797.