Family Caregiver Appreciation Day, Nov. 16

Taking care of a loved one who is elderly or disabled is never a simple task, but the Home Care Alliance of Massachusetts aims to make it a little easier with a unique event called Family Caregiver Appreciation Day, which will be held at the Hogan Center at College of the Holy Cross on Tuesday, November 16 from 10:00am to 3:00pm.  The all-day event marks November as Family Caregiver Appreciation Month.

The day will include workshops conducted by the Elder & Disability Law Advocates, Massachusetts Commission for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing, Alzheimer’s Association of Massachusetts, Philips Lifeline, Central Mass. Agency on Aging, Commonwealth Medicine, and Aviv Centers for Living. A critically-acclaimed independent short film titled “The Beautiful Hills of Brooklyn,” which deals with aging issues, will see its first local showing. Attendees will also hear inspirational presentations from a pair of authors who have written about caregiving.

Walgreens Pharmacy will conduct a flu shot clinic, and the MA College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences’ Pharmacy Outreach Program will provide attendees with a ”Medication Check-up” to review meds and answer any questions they have.  Caregivers can bring any medications (including prescriptions, over- the-counter medications, vitamins and supplements) they or a loved one currently takes on the day of the event.

Interested agencies can help the Alliance promote the event by distributing this flier to patients, families, and around your local community.

Several agencies have already committed to supporting attendees at the event by donating homemaker/aide hours to a “Free Care For Caregivers” bank to provide respite care that day to allow family caregivers to attend the event.  Agencies interested in donating respite care hours should contact Patricia Kelleher as soon as possible!

Agencies can also register family caregiver attendees yourself at your agency and send a single list to us.  We would like some form of contact information – either a mailing address or email address – in addition to the names of attendees so we can send confirmations and additional info about the event.

Return to www.thinkhomecare.org.

How is An ACO Like a Unicorn? – and Other Questions Raised at October Payment Reform Meeting

At the October 6th meeting,  the Committee charged with dissecting and debating formation of new payment reform strategies in Massachusetts raised as many questions as it answered. One of the bigger areas for today’s debate: the degree of prescriptiveness or flexibility of authorizing statutory language.  While there was general agreement among business leaders and trade associations for large provider groups (hospitals and doctors, in particular) that flexibility be the goal, there was some concern that too much flexibility might dilute the reform’s key provision: Accountability.   (“If we don’t spell out who is accountable for what and too whom,   we risk having none,” was how one participant put it.)   Home health and behavioral health providers were united in expressing concern that too much “flexibility” could undermine access to  essential “downstream” services in the interest of cost savings.

Other questions debated without little resolution: what is the relationship to be between ACOs and insurers?   Can models exists with very different levels of  integration (full vs virtual, of payment (fully bundled, partially for only certain services)?  How prescriptive should oversight be on collecting and reporting of quality data?   The idea of allowing – at least initially – many models had significant (although not universal support), including the Alliance’s. There was at least one expressed opinion that virtually  integrated ACOs could simply mimic the fee for service system that the state is committed to moving away from.  This was somewhat countered by the support for transparency and shared “performance risk” across collaborating entities that has been shown in some demonstrations, such as STAAR,  can begin to improve outcomes.   HHS Secretary Judy Ann Bigby indicated support for tiers of  integration that could be seen as “stages of payment reform development” with an oversight Board assessing how various models are working and then changing incentives to move system towards the most effective.

As to the apropos unicorn analogy, it came from Mass Hospital Association VP Jim  Fitzpatrick.  Fitzpatrick quipped that ACOs were like unicorns in that no one has ever really seen one locally, but we all seem to know what they look like.   Indeed!

Mass Moving on Comprehensive Payment Reform

The Massachusetts Committee on the Status of Payment Reform Legislation has begun meeting regularly with an aggressive schedule to  draft an outline of legislation to implement comprehensive payment reform.  Secretary Judy Ann Bigby, who chairs the Committee,  has committed to a process that is open to input from all interested stakeholders and experts.

The Committee will next convene on October 6th;  on the agenda:  the structure and regulatory construct for creating and monitoring Accountable Care Organizations.   Among the questions to be considered: what will be legislated in terms of operating structure and what will be left  to a proposed “Oversight Board” to monitor?   How tightly integrated should operating ACOs be – and can many different models for “integration” exist?   How will members be assigned to or chose an ACO?   And, the very central questions involving  provider relations with ACOs: can primary care MDs be in only one or multiple, and what of specialists and other providers?

The later – the role and relationships of providers who are neither hospitals or doctors – has been and will be the focus of the Alliance’s participation on the Task Force.   Based of positions drafted by our Legislative and Policy Committee, the Alliance has submitted initial comments that:

– express strong support for ACOs  with different configurations that vary  from tightly to virtually integrated and models that allow a variety of provider payment configurations .  

– support making explicit in the ACO enabling  legislation that each ACO model must  receive global payment to reflect – and be able to manage  – the full continuum of care settings and services for its assigned patients.

– require that attention and financial resources must be made available to allow providers in an ACO’s post acute care network to connect to integrated IT infrastructure for clinical care management.

Future discussion will focus on modeling global payments and the role and composition of the Oversight Board.

The Alliance welcomes and encourages member feedback – to us or to the Committee directly – on these critical discussions.  Comment or send to pkelleher@hcalliancema.org.

Return to www.thinkhomecare.org.

Reminder of PECOS deadline

As of October 4, Medicare home health agencies will be receiving warning messages from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) in response to claims where the ordering physician is not enrolled in PECOS (Provider Enrollment, Chain, and Ownership System).

Agencies will still be paid for claims, but the warning message will indicate that such payments will be denied as of January 3, 2011.

For more background on this issue, visit previous newsfeed posts here.

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New CMS Proposed Rule Issued on Provider Screening, etc.

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services issued a new proposed rule on September 20 that lays out changes in provider screening, suspension of payments, fraud control, temporary moratorium criteria, and cross program terminations.

A summary of the rule will be made available in this week’s issue of UPDATE for Alliance members.

Those interested in submitting comments, which are due by November 16, can be made electronically by clicking here, or by mail at the address below:

  • Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, Department of Health and
    Human Services, Attention: CMS-6028-P, P.O. Box 8020, Baltimore, MD
    21244-8020.

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HCA Welcomes New Member: Visiting Angels of Cape Cod

The Alliance is pleased to welcome its newest member, Visiting Angels of Cape Cod, a private care agency in Harwich, Massachusetts.

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Boston Globe: Mass. Recasting Health Payments

The Boston Globe reported on the Committee on the Status of Payment Reform Legislation, charged with making a recommendation to the state legislature regarding the formation of Accountable Care Organizations.

The Home Care Alliance sits on the committee chaired by Health and Human Services Secretary JudyAnn Bigby and is representing home care and home health in laying the groundwork for the reform of health payments.

For more info, see the Boston Globe article here or the link to the committee’s work above.

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Cape Cod Times: Taking Steps to Reduce Fall Injuries

The Falls Prevention Coalition hosted the fourth annual Falls Prevention Awareness Day at the State House on Wednesday, September 22. The Home Care Alliance was recognized as one of the founding members of the coalition and spoke at the event, which also included remarks from the Department of Public Health, State Senator Patricia Jehlen, and Secretary of Elder Affairs Ann Hartstein.

The Cape Cod Times reported on the event that promoted Tai Chi as a means for elders to retain balance and strength and the article is available here.

More from this event will be posted on the HCA Facebook page.

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Attending Mass-ALFA

The Alliance will be exhibiting at the Massachusetts Assisted Living Facilities  (Mass-ALFA) Conference tomorrow, distributing Resource Directories and seeking new referral sources for our members.

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Sixteen Agencies Accredited

The Alliance established the accreditation program as a means to promote quality services, ethical business standards, and superior employment practices. A list of accredited agencies is available here.

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Continue reading “Sixteen Agencies Accredited”