Hospital at Home program growing rapidly
As we seek to serve a growing population as effectively as possible, a new aspect of healthcare is emerging: the option for patients to receive care at home that would traditionally have been provided in a hospital.
Anna McMillan, director of Intermountain’s Hospital Level Care at Home program, said this helps patients heal faster and saves money for everyone.
“Hospital Level Care at Home is just what it sounds like,” Anna said. “You are receiving the level of care you would get in a hospital in the comfort of your own home. Patients at home have access to providers, nurses, including in-home nurses, plus tele-nurses, meals, imaging, labs — anything you would need in a hospital setting. You can eat your own food and sleep in your own bed. You have your family there, and you can have your dog next to you, which is very important for some people.”
This program also helps hospitals that are full or nearly full. It means Intermountain may not need to build as many new buildings, which saves money.
“It’s about getting patients the right care at the lowest possible cost, and trying to meet the patient where they’re at,” Anna said. “And it will reduce the number of beds to be built.”
For now, the program is driven primarily by provider referrals, but as patients become familiar with Hospital at Home, Anna expects they will request it. Some 1,800 patients have already utilized the service, and the census tripled in the last year. The team hopes it will grow even more in the following year.
Hospital at Home caregivers are drawn from the telehub and the resource pool. Most are accustomed to traveling to various hospitals to work, so going to a private residence isn’t much different. The service is currently available at 11 hospitals in Utah, from Logan to St. George.
Anna said the service has had “zero serious safety events” and has resulted in high-quality care and low 30-day readmission rates.
“As clinicians, we don’t talk a lot about treatment at home, but patients heal better in the comfort of their own home,” she said. “This is becoming the wave of future across the nation, and for Intermountain it is going to become a new norm. Hospitals will always be needed, but there’s going to be more and more we can do in the home as technology improves.”
Manager, Provider Network Management
2moIf the hospitals insist on reimbursement terms for services provided in-home at the same level as services provided in a brick and mortar hospital, there is no cost savings. In-hospital reimbursement rates are negotiatied based on the expense associated with the services rendered within the building. The hospital’s expenses are not the same when the same services are provided in a patients home and perhaps via tele-medicine or by EMTs rather than Nurses. Transitioning patients from the hospital to their home for care surely has its health benefits as well as cost-saving benefits, for the hospitals. However, until hospitals become open to reimbursement rates that share their cost savings with Insurers, Insurers will remain hestitant to reimburse for in-home hospital level care. This isn’t an opportunity for hospitals to make money by redirecting care to a cost savings setting for them while receiving in-hospital level reimbursement from Insurers.
President at Gomez Corp Financial Advisory & Insurance
2moLove this