“More than 80% of 176 home health and hospice providers surveyed March 31 said the virus has reduced up to a fifth of their workforce, a Home Care Association of New York State poll found,” reports Modern Healthcare on April 9, noting that “telehealth can help mitigate PPE shortages and staffing constraints as well as boost COVID-19 containment efforts.”
“One other important area of urgent need is greater flexibility and reimbursement under Medicare for remote-monitoring technologies — like home telehealth — that can be used to manage patient care and extend the point of contact to in-home patients remotely in certain circumstances or phases in the care plan,” [HCA President Al Cardillp] said in prepared remarks. “While New York’s Medicaid system has rightly allowed such flexibility for telehealth services and billing, the same must be done under Medicare so that these powerful tools can be brought to bear more uniformly for safety reasons.”