COVID-19 Testing in Home Care Hits Full Swing
Approximately 650 home care clinicians have so far enrolled in HCA’s recently launched “Home Care Clinician Training for COVID-19 Testing” initiative, funded by the Mother Cabrini Health Foundation.
As we reported in last month's Capitol Report, the program trains home care clinicians on COVID-19 testing procedures. This enlists them to: help grow the state’s needed COVID-19 testing capacity; more seamlessly obtain results for a vulnerable population under their care; and more appropriately test patients who are homebound or especially susceptible to health risks if the only other testing option requires travel to a congregate facility.
Further background is on the testing program's home page, including a new set of Q&As that go in-depth about the physician authorization process for testing in home care, reimbursement, and who can be tested in the home environment, among other issues.
|
|
HCA Announces Partnership with Selfhelp on Statewide Virtual Senior Center Service
The distress of social isolation and technology’s power to help overcome this divide are well understood by all New Yorkers amid the COVID-19 health emergency.
Older adults, especially those who are homebound, are uniquely susceptible to these perils — now more so than ever.
HCA announced the initiative in a press release earlier this month.
|
|
HCA, Partners Urge Continuation of NYC PPE Supply Effort
HCA and home care providers are urging the NYC Department of Health and Mental Hygiene (DOHMH) to continue supplying personal protective equipment (PPE) for home care under our existing coordination effort.
Of great concern, NYC DOHMH has signaled its intent to cease its PPE distributions on the basis that the surge of COVID-19 patients in hospitals has eased. However, home care providers have not seen any decrease in the need for PPE to serve COVID-19 positive and high-risk patients at home — a message communicated to city health officials earlier this month.
|
|
More Home Care COVID-19 Headlines
For other looks at home care’s COVID-19 role, needs, and service, please see some of these recent news headlines below.
|
|
Home Care and Hospice Spotlight on Long Island
The article may be one of the most comprehensive, to date, about home care’s COVID-19 efforts, and we encourage legislators representing Long Island districts to take a look.
It covers VNS’s: new training protocols; expanded use of virtual visits, breathing devices, oxygen, Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) and other equipment; new demands on hospice services and hospice environmental modifications to ensure the safety of patients; and more.
In a letter to the editor, Taylor further describes her agency’s vital “supportive care from prevention to recovery.” Specific home care treatments for COVID-19 patients include: breathing exercises, medication review, oxygen, physical therapies to improve muscle strength and overall functions, and basic education about the virus. These are critical functions of home care’s public health role.
HCA also spoke recently to Long Island-based Newsday about the impact of COVID-19 on home care employment generally throughout New York State, noting that most provider agencies (73 percent) have seen at least a 1 to 10 percent decline in their home health aide workforce, with many agencies seeing greater impacts.
|
|
NY Home Health Facing $200M in 2020 Losses Due to COVID-19
HCA is calling for Congressional funds to New York home care providers at the epicenter of the COVID-19 crisis who, we estimate, face at least $200 million in losses, due to lost service capacity, personal protective equipment costs, and other factors.
“We need the NY delegation action to include, by whatever acceptable method, a priority fiscal aid target of $200 million for our state’s home health agencies,” HCA President and CEO Al Cardillo wrote to the entire New York Congressional Delegation. “We appeal to you to work with congressional colleagues to provide for this urgent constituent support.”
This $200 million impact estimate is based on data from a sample of agencies. The sample was then trended using statistics for total home care service volume statewide and "weighted for areas known to be hot spots across New York State, recognizing that not all regions of the state are equivalently impacted,” HCA recently told Home Health Care News.
In a statewide campaign, over 2,000 individuals from home care agencies across New York have written to Congress echoing this call.
HCA is also working with state and national home care partners to urge such targeted relief in the Congressional bill package, as well as in a pool of funds previously passed by Congress and allocated to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services for COVID-19 relief. Such pools have substantially missed home care.
|
|
HCR Home Care Develops COVID-19 “Bounce-Back” Committee
The article describes HCR’s engagement efforts to regain staff after a caseload drop of 15 percent, HCR’s long-term strategy for meeting personal protective equipment (PPE) needs, and more.
HCR serves patients in many legislative districts, including 26 upstate counties, with 5 branch offices. See the map here.
|
|
Politico New York Reports on Workforce Shortages
In a recent article for Politico New York on COVID-19 workforce shortages, HCA noted the “slight rebound” in workforce numbers that our members have reported anecdotally. However, “before the pandemic, agencies in New York state reported between 21 percent and 23 percent of their home health aide or nursing positions were unfilled due to staffing shortages. Now to overlay, on top of that, a public health emergency that results in workforce capacity decreases of 10 percent, 15 percent or 20 percent or higher, you’re trying to rebound to a position that was already understaffed,” said HCA Communications Director Roger Noyes.
|
|
Got questions? Contact HCA's Communications Director Roger Noyes at [email protected] or (518) 810-0665. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
