by aht | Oct 21, 2020 | Industry News
A landmark legislation may be changing the face of hospice care. This past June, Rhode Island Senator Sheldon Whitehouse introduced a bill that will improve access to home health and hospice care for Medicare beneficiaries. Whitehouse said the bill is an effort to...
by aht | Oct 12, 2020 | Industry News
Palliative care is the fastest-growing medical specialty in America, says Managed Care Magazine. And for good reason: it’s a program that continues to prove its value, not just by improving patient care but also by dramatically reducing healthcare costs for insurance...
by aht | Oct 8, 2020 | Patient Care
Studies show that the majority of patients and caregivers find comfort in discussing concerns over the phone with a nurse, but they are often hesitant to use after-hours call services. Many patients and caregivers view after-hours calls as disturbances because they...
by Sheri | Oct 2, 2020 | Hospice Administration, Hospice Nursing, Patient Care
ThedaCare at Home, a hospice and home-health provider located in Appleton, Wisconsin, was facing unprecedented staffing concern. “There were four people positioned for retirement,” Bobbie Thompson, Manager of Clinical Office Operations at ThedaCare at Home recalls,...
by aht | Oct 1, 2020 | Hospice Administration
Because of the demanding nature of the hospice industry, clinical administrators, hospice directors, and after-hours coordinators often struggle to find ways to provide quality care while keeping a tight rein on staffing costs. Quality care is the number one priority...
by aht | Sep 30, 2020 | Hospice Administration, Hospice Nursing, Industry News
The surveys established as a result of the IMPACT Act are coming and before your hospice can pass with flying colors, it will help hospice administrators to know where others have failed. Key to understanding the pitfalls is the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid (CMS)...
by aht | Sep 26, 2020 | Industry News
After-hours telephone triage has become an important resource for hospices facing staffing shortages or who are concerned about nursing staff burnout. But there are a lot of myths out there about the role of after-hours telephone triage, particularly as it relates to...
by aht | Sep 24, 2020 | Patient Care
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid (CMS) scrutiny of hospice care continues. Spending, discharge trends, emergency room (ER) visits, and the frequency of skilled visits that hospice patients received in the last days of their care are the focus of recent Medicare...
by aht | Sep 13, 2020 | Hospice Administration
Hospice administrators might think it’s cost efficient to hire a traditional answering service to take messages and/or transfer incoming calls to the on-call hospice staff, but there are hidden costs to their limited services. When shopping for an after-hours...
by aht | Sep 11, 2020 | Hospice Administration
Busy hospice providers need reliable after-hours care that doesn’t put extra demands on already overworked staff. That care also has to fit seamlessly with your operational protocols so there is no disruption to the quality or continuity of care given to patients and...
