How Acute Home Healthcare Can Improve Senior Access to Care
Acute home healthcare emerged during the coronavirus pandemic out of necessity but could remain in the healthcare system as a key strategy for lowering costs and improving senior care.
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- The case for acute home healthcare has become increasingly clear, Amal Agarwal, DO, vice president of home solutions business development and strategy at Humana, expressed to Healthcare Strategies.
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During the coronavirus pandemic, the thought of going to the hospital has evoked anxiety due to the high capacity, the risk of catching COVID-19, and the limited access to elective procedures.
However, to some extent, the pandemic has amplified concerns that already existed, particularly for seniors. The hospital and emergency room care have always included some amount of risk for the elderly, who may have weakened immune systems and restricted mobility. Such visits are also expensive, taking up a significant share of each premium dollar.
Agarwal, who also serves as an emergency physician for the US Department of Veterans Affairs, has witnessed the realities of these challenges in the emergency room.
“When we think about some acute care in the home or urgent care in the home, this is a relatively new model,” Agarwal explained.
“Traditionally, patients call their primary care provider and if the primary care provider can see them in the office then they go to the office or, more often than not, they’re routed to the emergency room for that need to be addressed. But now we’re seeing these new models evolve with acute care in the home where it’s a mix between urgent care or advanced urgent care and some level of emergency room care and we bring that care into the patient’s home on demand.”
With acute home healthcare, seniors remain in the familiar environments of their own homes, care costs may drop, and providers gain a closer perspective on the social determinants of health barriers that seniors may face. This care delivery model could address conditions such as urinary tract infections, dehydration, or pneumonia, depending on the severity.
CMS approved acute home healthcare during the pandemic as a solution for patients who needed acute-level care that could not be conveyed by telehealth. The agency has also paved the way for hospitals to provide in-home care during the public health emergency, a waiver which 200 hospitals submitted within a few months.
Agarwal shared how payers and providers can move forward with their own acute home healthcare programs in the future.
