Home Care Daily - National Home Care Industry News

Home health care has become an integral part of the overall health care industry. As the population in the United States ages, it is placing increased pressure on short and long-term health care providers. More people, if given the choice, would prefer to age in place — remaining home, even as they deal with some serious health issues — as opposed to nursing home care or other facility-based care.

New York is planning on significant Medicaid reimbursement cuts to the nursing home sector in the state. An estimated $250 million is proposed to be cut from the Medicaid assistance that the state’s Department of Health offers nursing homes. Critics claim this is going to cause a potential mass exodus of nurses and other staff, thus leaving vulnerable patients without adequate care.

Although the in-home care industry is the leading job creator and demand for these services is far outpacing other types of long-term care, those rising costs are starting to take a toll on various agencies, organizations, and individuals who desire to remain home.

When the federal government began placing increased financial pressure on hospitals to reduce their readmission rates, there was significant pushback. Many hospitals — especially those in poorer regions of the country — complained that this would impact their bottom line too much and cause them to no longer offer support for everyone who needed it.

As more legislators become aware of the impact home health care has on elderly and disabled adults, they also discover that relatively and traditionally low wages are hampering agencies’ abilities to attract, hire, and retain valuable caregivers. Recently, legislation was put forward in Massachusetts to try and help secure vital caregivers for the aging population in the state.

A social services pilot program designed by HUD (the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development) is aimed at determining the value that receiving healthcare services at home can offer aging and disabled seniors. The focus of this program is to find out how effective it can be at not only providing an option for aging seniors to remain home, but to also reduce long-term health care costs in the country.

Congress is seeking to bolster the home care industry with new legislation. Even though it’s the number one job creator in the country, and that trend is expected to continue for another five or 10 years, at least, stagnantly low wages make it exceedingly difficult for agencies and other businesses to retain valuable caregivers.

When CMS (the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services) slashed reimbursement rates for home health care, it placed significantly more pressure on the industry itself. Out of this pressure, though, came innovation. A lot of the innovation was in the form of technology and it has impacted millions of lives in the years since.