Leaders of the National Association for Home Care & Hospice issued a call to action to home health members Sunday night during the opening session of the Financial Management Conference.
“We as an industry have to band together and continue to fight what CMS is trying to do to our industry,” said Melinda Gaboury, chair of NAHC’s Home Care and Hospice Financial Managers Association, and CEO of Healthcare Provider Solutions Inc. “We cannot stand by and let this happen … We have to fight.”
The three-day conference in New Orleans convenes against a backdrop of challenging home health and hospice events. NAHC has filed a lawsuit against the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services over a proposed home health rule that threatens to cut 2.2% in Medicare payments for 2024. Meanwhile, hospice is undergoing enhanced scrutiny in four states for sham hospices that have cropped up in recent years. And a Special Focus Program, informal dispute resolution process and other measures for underperforming hospices ison the table through the proposed home health rule.
A proposed CMS rule that would require that 80% of Medicaid payments for home- and community-based services go to direct care workers’ wages also is drawing scorn.
But the onerous proposed home health rule was the theme of the night. Leaders reiterated a message to members throughout the session: Speak up for yourself and your peers.
“When we say we have to fight, we have to fight on Capitol Hill and we have to fight in our court system and that’s what we are going to do on behalf of our members,” said Ken Albert, president and CEO of Androscoggin Home Healthcare and Hospice, and chairman of the NAHC board of directors.
He added, “If you’re in this room, please heed the call to advocacy.”
Bill Dombi, president of NAHC, echoed that.
“When we ask you to get engaged in all this, get engaged,” he told members. “It becomes noise and noise affects Washington … This is atom bomb, nuclear weapon type noise kind of levels we’re going to need and count on you for it.”
He called the proposed home health rule “a litmus for our entire country.”
“Are we going to support the healthcare services provided for these vulnerable people or are we going to cut $870 million out of a small benefit, relatively, to begin with, and not expect to see there’d be an impact?” he asked.
Home health agencies are experiencing the effects of the 2023 permanent behavioral adjustment of $635 million. They are reducing the geographic area they serve, slashing programs, cutting the volume of visits and putting more responsibility on family members, he said.
“We are at that crossroads right now where this country has to decide: Do they favor care in the home or do they simply want to abandon people – out of sight, out of mind?” Dombi said.
He urged members to voice support to congressional leaders for S. 2137, which would protect home health providers from Medicare payment reductions.
The conference runs through Tuesday.
