Why Home Health Care Is Suddenly Harder to Come by for Medicare Patients
- 2020-02-04
- Kaiser Health News
The decision came out of the blue. “Your husband isn’t going to get any better, so we can’t continue services,” an occupational therapist told Deloise “Del” Holloway in early November. “Medicare isn’t going to pay for it.”
The therapist handed Del a notice explaining why the home health agency she represented was terminating care within 48 hours. “All teaching complete,” it concluded. “No further hands on skilled care. Wife states she knows how to perform exercises.”
But its decision comes as home health agencies across the country are grappling with a significant change as of Jan. 1 in how Medicare pays for services. (Managed-care-style Medicare Advantage plans have their own rules and are not affected.)
Agencies are responding aggressively, according to multiple interviews. They are cutting physical, occupational and speech therapy for patients. They are firing therapists. And they are suggesting that Medicare no longer covers certain services and terminating services altogether for some longtime, severely ill patients.
To qualify for services, a person must be homebound and in need of intermittent skilled care (less than eight hours a day) from nurses or therapists.
Encompass Health of Dallas serves about 45,000 home health patients in 33 states, most of them covered by Medicare. It’s using an artificial intelligence tool to predict what kind of services, and how many, patients will need. “We’ve been able to eliminate some wasted visits” and become more efficient, said Bud Langham, chief strategy and innovation officer.