In healthcare delivery sequence, home care services are situated downstream from acute and post-acute care (skilled nursing facilities.)  One of the primary goals of home care is to help patient transition back into home environment.  Nurses, Therapists, Home health aides and other interdisciplinary team members such as Social Workers, Nutritionists work together to coach patient and caregiver to adjust to their "new normal."  This interdisciplinary team also teaches patients and caregivers a very important skill of self-triage - Who to call when (nurse versus a physician or 911.) 

I believe that the value proposition of home health services is not highlighted sufficiently when patients are initially setup with home care services.  

I hypothesize that patients who discontinue home care services within the first week do not fully appreciate the value of home care services.  My advice for healthcare systems and home care agencies is to build...

More than ever, Covid-19 crises has demonstrated the value of having a holistic approach to patient management.  Covid-19 crisis has shown how age, underlying chronic conditions, socioeconomic status, and other risk-factors can influence mortality of a patient. 

In my prior post, I talked about how home care agencies providing high-quality, cost-effective care can position themselves as value-adding entities during this pandemic. All patients being admitted into home care are not alike, agencies must develop clinical training and management strategies that help clinicians case manage patients coming from different referral sources with different referral source based risk factors.  

Since majority (>75%) of home care patients admitted into home care services are from in-patient settings (short term acute care hospital, Skilled Nursing Facility, inpatient acute rehab) it is paramount for home care agencies to develop a specific clinical assessment focus and clinical...