How Data Can Help Home-Based Care Providers Zero In On Growth Opportunities

Home Health Care News | By Patrick Filbin

Home-based care providers, and others in the post-acute care space, need to start collecting the right kind of data in order to get quality outcomes and reach growth targets.
 
Being on top of Minimum Data Set (MDS) collection and having accurate and detailed coding can be two of the most important aspects of improving outcomes.
 
“If your coding is done accurately and correctly — and if you’re able to leverage your MDS — you can start to figure out ways to use that data in meaningful ways,” Pathway Health COO Lisa Thomson, said during a panel at the LeadingAge Illinois conference this week. “That all could help drive some opportunities for competency training, clinical training, programmatic development, strategic positioning and aligning with specific partners to really grow your business and retain staff.”
 
Collecting and using data can be an overwhelming process for home-based care providers. That’s especially true when it seems like the rules and regulations change on a yearly basis.
 
“The demographics are shifting, and continue to shift, for the type of care and services that we provide,” Thompson said. “It’s important for providers to know how we take some key data points and help us use those data points to drive decisions.”
 
Thompson used the example of providers across the post-acute spectrum understanding what lane they want to operate in.
 
Improving quality measures for clinical and chronic diseases is a huge opportunity for providers, Thompson said, and finding a niche within that can be helpful.
 
Using public data that is now available — due to CMS requiring certain measures to be collected — is one way to find those niches.
 
“Those chronic diseases are ones that our physician partners, our clinician partners and our acute care partners are being monitored for,” Thompson said. “Who’s the best at chronic disease management in the whole health care sector? We are, as leaders in post-acute care. Chronic diseases are where we have that opportunity.”
 
By narrowing in on service needs, and using MDS and ICD-10 coding, providers have the ability to build towards a certain focus area.
 
“Using this data, you can look at trends in your organization and [leverage that against] your marketplace to see what’s the growth potential for Medicare and Medicaid individuals with those disease states that align with the likeness and the demographics of your organization,” Thompson said. “Or you could make changes in your organization to build towards a certain focus.”

Read Full Article