Wound care innovations help providers care for patients After nearly a decade in the wound care world, I still continue to be amazed, surprised and inspired. It’s been a time I’ve thoroughly enjoyed– getting a front-row seat to innovations, seeing the remarkable commitment of providers, and marveling at the constant effort from all I meet…
Let’s face it, millennials get a hard rap these days with words like “entitled” and “lazy” being used to describe this generation, which broadly includes those born between 1981 and 1996. These perceptions are not only unfair in their characterization, they’re especially unhelpful if you’re trying to understand how to recruit and retain the best…
With the wealth of information available online, people are more educated and involved in their own healthcare decisions. Instead of passively receiving treatment, they’re doing their own research, seeking out the best services and comparing providers. All this has created a more competitive environment for outpatient therapy practices. To compete for today’s savvy healthcare consumer,…
End-of-life care is undergoing enormous change in recent years–spurred by a wave of aging baby boomers, more people suffering from chronically ill diseases and new approaches to care that are changing the way people experience the last days of their life. Hospice care at the forefront On the one hand, hospice care has never been…
Hospice providers are under the spotlight as regulators continue to ramp up their investigatory efforts to identify quality, compliance and other deficiencies in hospice care. Just recently, the Office of Inspector General (OIG) recommended that CMS strengthen the survey process as part of its guidance for improving the Medicare hospice program. With so much focus…
For years, families have been using birth coaches called doulas to help make the childbirth experience more comfortable and supportive for mothers. Now, both volunteer and professionally trained doulas are offering guidance during the end-of-life period as well. Hope Hospice in Florida is one recent example of a provider taking advantage of specialized doula training….
When CMS replaced RCS-1 with the Patient-Driven Payment Model (PDPM) in April, we analyzed the proposed new payment model for skilled nursing facilities (SNFs) and concluded the following: PDPM offers important revisions and advantages over RCS-1, but the essence of the system is very much the same. In fact, PDPM could be aptly named RCS-1.1…
A significant win for home health care took place this year when Independence at Home (IAH), a demonstration project from the CMS Innovation Center, was extended in February for an additional two years. Created under the Affordable Care Act, IAH has been testing the effectiveness of providing primary care services in the home setting for…
There are an estimated 50 million people worldwide diagnosed with dementia, and that number is expected to almost double every 20 years, reaching 75 million by 2030. According to the Alzheimer’s Association, 1 in 3 seniors dies with Alzheimer’s disease or another form of dementia. With a growing elderly population living with the disease, understanding…
Last month, Allscripts, an EHR provider for hospital and health systems – including post-acute care facilities – suffered a ransomware attack that brought business to a standstill for roughly 1,500 clients who couldn’t access critical information and services, including patient records and e-prescribing. Allscripts is just one of many healthcare organizations hit by ransomware over…