Stay ahead in 2024 with insights into the latest trends shaping Home Health Care. Explore innovations that are revolutionizing patient care and agency practices.
In this blog, we discuss how some of these trends are shaping the direction of the Home Healthcare industry.
Home Health Care Trends for 2024
The demand for home and community-based care will continue to grow due to the continued aging of baby boomers, the preference of the elderly populations to age at home, and continued pressure to reduce the overall cost of healthcare. Even though increasing demand for Home Care Services will provide many growth opportunities, home healthcare providers will continue to face significant headwinds in 2024.
The labor shortage will be an ongoing and significant challenge in 2024. Even with the options to provide Telehealth, home care companies will still need more labor. In addition to labor shortage, wage growth, and inflation will pose additional challenges for home care agencies. Reimbursement cuts and other regulatory requirements will also put significant pressure on the bottom line for home care agencies.
Home and Community Based Services will continue to evolve regarding the breadth and complexity of services. Diversification of services, including outpatient therapy at home, home-based mental health, and other higher acuity services, will help home care agencies attract new referrals and counter some of the cost pressures. Expanding services will also lead to improved patient satisfaction through increased continuity of care for patients.
Even though home healthcare agencies face many challenges, there are also many opportunities. Despite all the challenges facing the home healthcare industry, it will continue to grow and play an integral part in providing care at home. Technology will play a vital role in helping home care agencies to do more with less and improve operation efficiency. Integrated Home Care Software platform with the right technology and tools will play a significant role in helping home agencies meet these challenges and continue to grow.
Trend #1 Continued Growth for Home-Based Services
Demand for Home-Based Services will continue to grow due to the retirement of the baby boomers and their desire to receive care at home. Industry watchers expect the elderly population to cross 80 million in 2050. Adults over 65 years old (77 million) will outnumber children under 18 (76.5) million).
U.S. Home Health Care is projected to grow from $94.17 billion in 2022 to $153.19 billion by 2029 (Source: Fortune Business Insights).
Continued growth in demand for home-based services will pose enormous challenges for providers in the future.
Continued growth in demand for home-based services and labor shortages will pose enormous challenges for home-based service providers in the future. Home Care Agencies should be prepared to invest in their employees and the right Home Care Software platform to meet these challenges and take advantage of the opportunities.
Trend #2 Labor Shortages
The labor shortage will be a permanent challenge in healthcare. The sharp increase in the elderly population from 35 million in 2000 to over 80 million in 2050 also means that the number of caregivers per elderly could drop dramatically if the current work and retirement patterns do not change. (Source: The 2030 Problem: Caring for Aging Baby Boomers).
Demand for healthcare services is growing much faster than the availability of caregivers.
Home care agencies should leverage technology to reimagine how employees work and deliver care to improve the staff's productivity. Using Intelligent Automation (or bots) to automate many repetitive tasks to free up time for employees will help agencies improve employee productivity, satisfaction, and quality of care. Agencies should develop training programs to enhance employees' skills in technology and process changes.
Technology can never replace human interaction in the process of delivering care. It can only supplement care providers to free up their time so that they can do what they enjoy doing – providing care. Home care agencies should invest in the right Home Care Software platform and staff to meet the challenges posed by the labor shortage.
Read other articles:
Revenue Cycle Management for Home Care Agencies - Addressing Staffing Challenges - Part 1
Clinical Documentation for Home Health Care Agencies – Addressing Staffing Challenges - Part 3
Trend #3 Regulatory and Reimbursement Challenges
Home Health Care agencies will continue to face increased regulatory demands while facing challenges in reimbursement. With reimbursement reductions from Medicare, Medicaid, and Managed Care companies, agencies will be forced to meet all the regulatory changes with limited availability of labor.
State and Federal regulations regarding labor and wages will also put a lot of pressure on cost and the agency's bottom line.
State and Federal regulations regarding labor and wages will also put a lot of pressure on cost and the agency's bottom line.
Electronic Visit Verification (EVV) requirements for skilled home care services starting in 2024 will also add additional operational challenges to home care agencies.
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Trend #4 Diversification of Services and Payers
The continued growth of the aging population and its desire to receive care at home has driven the demand for home-based services, providing many growth opportunities for home care agencies.
With the increasing shift to value-based care, large MCOs and M.A. plans will push home care agencies to diversify their services to meet their demands. Physicians are more comfortable prescribing mental health, therapy, and other higher-skilled services, such as respiratory care, wound care, cardiological conditions, and orthopedics, to patients at home.
Diversification of services will help home care agencies hedge against revenue and reimbursement risks.
New delivery models such as SNF at Home and Hospital at Home are coming into play. Acute care and skilled nursing facilities are looking to partner with home health care agencies to transition more care to patients' homes.
Diversification of services, such as Certified Home Health, Non-Medical Personal Care, Private Duty Nursing, Therapy at Home, Pediatric Care, Mental Health, etc., will help home care agencies hedge against revenue and reimbursement risks in home care services.
Diversification of services will also help agencies maintain continuity of patient care and improve patient satisfaction.
In addition to expansion of services, home care agencies can also explore diversification of payers to mitigate the regulatory and reimbursement risks.
Trend #5 A.I. and Intelligent Automation
Even though Artificial Intelligence is creating a buzz in the industry, we believe AI in healthcare is still evolving. While AI will play a much more significant role in other areas of healthcare, such as pharmaceuticals, acute care, etc., home healthcare will also benefit from the advancement of AI technology. Mature and safe AI can provide real-time insights to caregivers to make information decisions, leading to better outcomes and patient satisfaction.
Robotics Process Automation can help home care agencies improve their operational efficiency.
While we wait for AI to mature to help patients without impacting their safety, Robotics Process Automation (RPA) or Intelligent Automation can help home care agencies improve their operational efficiency. Intelligent automation to automate repetitive and time-consuming tasks, such as eligibility verification, authorization management, billing, etc., will help agencies do more with less.
Automation should be part of the EMR software platform rather than using a different platform or partner for automation.
Trend #6 Leverage Technology
Home Health Care Agencies should leverage technology to meet the growing demand for home-based services and the challenges posed by the continued labor shortage, the need to offer additional services, regulatory changes, and cost pressures affecting the bottom line.
An integrated Home Care Software platform for all home-based services will eliminate redundant data entry and improve ease of use for employees.
Home care agencies should look for technology platforms that will proactively push exceptions to employees and caregivers, making it easy to manage by exception.
Integrated, effective, and efficient communication will be crucial in improving the quality of care and outcomes.
Home Health Care Agencies should leverage technology to improve operational efficiency and the agency's bottom line.
Conclusion
Despite reimbursement cuts, labor shortages, and other challenges, the future of home care remains bright. Home Health Care agencies investing in people and technology, along with diversification of services, will grow and thrive in the future.
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.