Unlock the secret to profitability for Home Health Care agencies with scheduling efficiency. Learn how optimized schedules can elevate your bottom line.

This blog will discuss how easy-to-use and advanced home care scheduling software and tools will help agencies improve employee productivity and bottom line.

Introduction

The demand for home health care services continues to grow due to the retirement of the baby boomers. US Census Bureau projects that the number of people over 65 will increase to 84 million by 2050, representing nearly 21% of the population. While the demand for home care is growing, the availability of caregivers to meet the need is declining, leading to an acute labor shortage. The number of available caregivers per elderly will go from 7 in 2021 to 3 in 2050.

The labor shortage will be an ongoing challenge to Home Care Agencies for the foreseeable future. Home Health Care Agencies typically spend about 60% of their revenue on employee wages, most of which will be for field employees providing patient care.

Efficient and optimal use of employees will directly impact improving the bottom line for home care agencies. Home Care Agencies should leverage technology to do more with less to meet the demand for home-based services and continue to grow.

“A national shortage of 151,000 caregivers will exist by 2030, and a 355,000 caregiver shortfall by 2040.”

— Global Coalition on Aging

Key Features to Improve Scheduling Efficiency and Bottom Line

The following are key Home Care Scheduling Software features to improve scheduling efficiency, and employee productivity, optimize cost, and enhance the agency's bottom line.

Ease of use

Ease of use is essential to improving the efficiency and productivity of schedulers. Schedulers’ ability to view all open shifts or visits on one screen, match available employees with patients, and schedule the employees on the same screen will improve the productivity of schedulers. Providing multiple scheduling views and the ability to switch from one view to another will help schedulers to be more efficient. Improving the productivity of the scheduler will directly lead to employee productivity and the agency's bottom line.

Intelligent Matching

Scheduling software should match patient preferences with employee skills, availability, distance, etc., and provide a list of matching employees to the scheduler for an open schedule. Having a list of available and matching employees will help the schedulers fill open shifts quickly and efficiently, reducing uncovered shifts and improving the bottom line.

Configurable Validations

Proactive alerts and validations, such as duplicate schedules, overtime, missing authorizations, etc., will alert the schedulers about potential issues at the point of scheduling. Proactively detecting and resolving problems during scheduling will reduce billing and payroll issues, improve employee productivity, reduce unnecessary payroll costs, and improve the agency's bottom line.

Publish Shift Offers and Available Shifts

The ability to publish shift offers and available shifts will create a pool of employees available to take the shift. Having a ready set of employees will reduce the need for schedulers to contract employees, improve scheduling efficiency, reduce uncovered shifts, improve employee productivity, and increase revenue and the agency's bottom line.

Authorization Integration

Keeping up with authorizations and staying within authorized hours will help Home Care Agencies minimize revenue leakage in the form of unbillable shifts and paying for services provided without authorization. Minimizing revenue leakage will improve the agency's bottom line.

Billing Integration

Effective schedule management is critical in improving revenue cycle management efficiency. Proactively detecting potential billing issues at the point of scheduling will help the billing team send out clean claims and improve the reimbursement timeline, cash flow, and agency bottom line.

Payroll

Timely and accurate payroll is critical for employee satisfaction. If not managed effectively, overtime and shift differential costs can quickly add up and reduce the agency's bottom line. Home Care Scheduling Software should help payroll staff minimize manual interventions to complete the payroll, thus improving the accuracy and timeliness of payroll. Effective integration of scheduling software with payroll tools will significantly reduce time spent on payroll and improve accuracy and timeliness.

Communication

Communication plays a crucial role in effectively filling open shifts for patients with matching employees. Schedulers usually spend a lot of time texting or talking with employees before scheduling one or more open shifts. Employee Portals, Family Portals, and integrated messaging applications will help schedulers communicate effectively with patients and employees. The ability to schedule reminders for employees and patients will significantly reduce missed shifts for patients and employees.

Conclusion

Improving the scheduling efficiency will play a vital role in improving employees' productivity, reducing revenue leakage and payroll costs, and improving the agency's bottom line. Home Care Agencies should leverage technology to optimize employee usage and productivity.

CareVoyant understands the scheduling needs of Home Care Agencies and provides scheduling tools to optimize employee schedules, helping home care agencies improve their profitability.

ABOUT CAREVOYANT

CareVoyant is a leading provider of cloud-based integrated enterprise-scale home health care software that can support all home-based services under ONE Software, ONE Patient, and ONE Employee, making it a Single System of Record. We support all home based services, including Home Care, Private Duty Nursing, Private Duty Non-Medical, Home and Community Based Services (HCBS), Home Health, Pediatric Home Care, and Outpatient Therapy at Home.

CareVoyant functions – Intake, Authorization Management, Scheduling, Clinical with Mobile options, eMAR/eTAR, Electronic Visit Verification (EVV), Billing/AR, Secure Messaging, Notification, Reporting, and Dashboards – streamline workflow, meet regulatory requirements, improve quality of care, optimize reimbursement, improve operational efficiency and agency bottom line.

For more information, please visit CareVoyant.com or call us at 1-888-463-6797.