Reimbursement:
Home Care Industry Vows To Fight Copay
Published on Fri Jan 21, 2011
Get ready for 'copay wars.' A home health agency copayment wouldn't just be bad for providers, it could also be devastating for patients and government spending, industry advocates warn. Copays "are wrong-headed ideas that have not only been proven to have a number of detrimental effects on beneficiaries requiring services, but to actually drive up health care costs," stresses the National Association for Home Care & Hospice. "Requiring the sickest of Americans to pay a fee to access home health care is an old and discredited idea," says NAHC's Val Halamandaris. "A co-payment would create a significant access barrier for Medicare beneficiaries who need medically necessary home health care per their doctor's orders," Andy Carter of the Visiting Nurse Associations of America says in a release. "These patients are much more likely to end up back in the hospital or another institutional setting at much greater costs," Carter says. Patients [...]