The Visiting Nurse Associations of America has released a tool to help home health providers, policymakers and payers develop better, safer and smoother care transitions. The VNAA Blueprint for Excellence is available free at http://www.vnaablueprint.org. The VNAA describes the tool as a pathway to best practices for home health care providers and a touchstone […]
by Audrey Kinsella Home healthcare clinicians have always prided themselves on being closer to their patients than other clinicians can be. They do not mean merely physically closer but speak of a personal closeness as well. They know pets’ names, favorite foods, and they know of the difficulties following directives regarding dietary needs, medication […]
by Liz Seegert Many sessions at this month’s World Health Care Congress focused on partnerships. Collaboration is a word we in post-acute care will hear a lot in the coming years, as primary care providers are forced to transition from fee-for-service to an outcomes-driven approach. Patient-centric care and innovation were top of mind when […]
With mobile technology continuing to become more pervasive and relevant within the healthcare continuum, put Booth #1528 on your dance card for this month’s NAHC Annual Meeting. Schaumburg (Chicago), Illinois-based CellTrak will be demonstrating new cell-based product releases and enhancements for teams of mobile clinicians and home health aides. Details are provided in this […]
by Audrey Kinsella The upcoming Connected Health Symposium, sponsored by Boston’s Partners HealthCare, may inadvertently go unnoticed because it is scheduled concurrently with the NAHC Annual Meeting, but that would be unfortunate. Titled “Innovations to Build Value, Accountable Care, and Patient Engagement,” the October 25/26 confab will present dozens of high-level talks and presentations on […]
Medicare contractor CGS, which provides home health and hospice claims processing services in 17 states and the District of Columbia, has identified two computer errors that have been incorrectly rejecting certain claims for all Medicare contractors. The author provides an explanation of the errors drawn from the CGS web site, followed by specific information […]
Monday of this week was October 1, 2012, the first day of Federal Fiscal Year 2013. The first day of a new Supreme Court session and the first day of Medicare hospital readmission penalties. The mass media has finally heard that Medicare will reduce payments to hospitals with high readmission rates by a predetermined percentage […]
Ozark, Missouri-based HEALTHCAREfirst, Inc. opened nominations this week for its second annual Compassionfirst award. It will be presented again this year to the home health or hospice caregiver who goes above and beyond what is required and regularly shows genuine kindness, dedication and compassion when caring for others.”There are so many caregivers who deserve recognition […]
