Home Health & Hospice Week

Demographic shift helps explain increasing case-mix scores.

If you're looking for trends in home care to guide your agency's planning, don't miss this report.

Home health agencies will continue to be called on to serve an increasing number of patients recovering from hip and knee replacements in coming years, suggests a recent report by the federal Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality.

The report supports the idea that HHAs are seeing an increasing portion of post-acute, post-surgical patients in recent years, notes the National Association for Home Care & Hospice--changes that would help explain rising case-mix scores.

Key stats: Musculoskeletal procedures are performed more frequently on females and older patients (with a mean patient age of 60 years). Other findings include the following:

• The rate of knee arthroplasty surgeries was estimated at 79.1 procedures per 10,000 individuals over the age of 65 (as compared to 24.6 per 10,000 people 45 to 64 years of age). Hip replacement procedures were 67.6 per 10,000 elderly persons, compared with 14.2 procedures per 10,000 individuals between the ages of 45 and 64.

• Knee arthroplasty and hip replacement, two of the three most frequently performed procedures, have grown from 1977 to 2005 by 69 and 32 percent, respectively.

• Medicare bore the largest burden from hospital stays for these services (57.9 and 63.4 percent, respectively).

To see the report, Statistical Brief No. 34, "Hospital Stays Involving Musculoskeletal Procedures, 1997-2005," go to www.hcupus.ahrq.go/reports/statbriefs/sb34.pdf.