Literature Review

Tuesday Health launches revolutionary Supportive Care solution with $60 million of strategic investment from healthcare leadersInvestors Observier; by PR Newswire; 5/21/24Tuesday Health, a pioneer in value-based care dedicated to transforming serious illness, has launched its innovative supportive care solution in partnership with Valtruis, Blue Venture Fund, Mass General Brigham Ventures , and CareSource. This alliance brings a $60 million strategic investment to Tuesday Health, fueling its mission to redefine supportive care for patients and caregivers facing serious illnesses. "Leveraging clinical expertise, advanced data solutions, and cutting-edge technology, while partnering with Ohio's largest Medicaid plan, its largest hospice provider and the unmatched palliative care experience of Mass General, Tuesday Health is dedicated to tackling one of healthcare's biggest challenges-providing support and care in the right setting, at the right time, for those facing serious illness", said Jim Wieland, CEO of Tuesday Health.Editor's Note: What is the difference between supportive care and palliative care? Click here for a description from ASCO, the American Society of Clinical Oncology. 

Androscoggin Home Healthcare + Hospice rebrands to ‘Andwell Health Partners’ Home Health Care News; by Andrew Donlan; 5/21/24 The Maine-based Androscoggin Home Healthcare + Hospice is rebranding to “better reflect its evolutions and future,” and will be operating under the name Andwell Health Partners moving forward. ... Andwell – formerly Androscoggin – is a nonprofit operator that employs more than 500 workers across all 16 counties in Maine. The company ... has expanded past just home health care over the years to provide hospice, palliative, behavioral health and pediatric care services to patients. Its president and CEO, Ken Albert, has served on the board of the National Association for Home Care & Hospice (NAHC) ... including as chairperson of the board. ... The word Andwell is “an amalgamation of the organization’s history, mission and services,” the company said. Specifically, the “And” makes reference to Androscoggin, the “Well” emphasizes the focus on health and wellbeing and “Dwell” evokes its home-based care focus.

CVS could lose 10% of its Medicare Advantage members in 2025Becker's Payer Issues; by Rylee Wilson; 5/14/24CVS Health executives are bracing to lose up to 10% of Aetna's Medicare Advantage members next year, Bloomberg reported May 14. At an investor conference on May 14, CVS CFO Tom Cowhey said it's "entirely possible" the company loses a portion of its members in the coming year as it prioritizes profitability, according to Bloomberg. "That's OK because we need to get this business back on track," Mr. Cowhey said. Executives at CVS Health have said they will prioritize "margins over membership" in Medicare Advantage in the coming year.

The human side of AI: Insights on balancing automation and empathy Innovation & Tech Today; by Enrico Palmerino; 5/20/24 ... As AI automates more tasks with clinical precision, empathy is a critical human element we cannot overlook. That intangible ability to understand and share the feelings of another isn’t just a soft skill — it’s an essential catalyst for trust, loyalty, and genuine connection. Consider the healthcare industry, where empathy is (quite literally) often a matter of life and death. Can an AI-powered diagnostic system truly grasp a patient’s fear and vulnerability when facing a serious illness? ... Finding the delicate balance between leveraging AI automation and preserving human empathy is the new challenge before us. It’s a duality that will shape how businesses operate and how we interact with technology. ... Let the machines optimize processes while we optimize the ability to connect and inspire. In this harmonious future, AI is a tool that elevates us — not replaces us.Editor's Note: Is AI a hot topic among your leaders and interdisciplinary clinicians? Often, "empathy" and "communication" are cited as key cautions and conflicts. 

Telehealth is far from dead, says Providence’s Virtual Care ChiefMedCity News; by Katie Adams; 5/15/24This year has been a messy one for virtual care companies, but that doesn’t mean that telehealth is dead, according to Eve Cunningham, Providence’s chief of virtual care and digital health. In her view, virtual care can definitely still be an important part of the care delivery model — but only if it is embedded into the greater healthcare delivery ecosystem. This year hasn’t been a great one for virtual care companies. Optum shuttered its virtual care unit in April, Walmart closed its virtual care offering (as well as its entire healthcare unit) in May, and two of the country’s largest telehealth providers - Teladoc Health and Amwell - have both enacted major rounds of layoffs this year. But this doesn’t mean telehealth is dead, said Eve Cunningham, chief of virtual care and digital health at Providence, during a Tuesday interview at the Reuters Digital Health conference in San Diego.

Senate ramps up push to reform doctors' Medicare pay Modern Healthcare; by Michael Mcauliff; 5/20/24Declining doctors' pay in Medicare is getting its most serious look in nearly a decade in the Senate, with a bipartisan push launched Friday by the Senate Finance Committee. Doctors have grown especially vocal in recent years about falling Medicare reimbursement. Groups including the American Medical Association have estimated doctors were effectively getting paid 26% less in 2023 than in 2001 because the physician fee schedule set by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services is not adjusted for inflation. Physicians have also called for more flexibility within the pay system.

Home health, hospice veterans behind BoldAge PACE’s nationwide expansion Home Health Care News; by Andrew Donlan; 5/20/24 BoldAge PACE – a Program of All-Inclusive Care for the Elderly (PACE) operator – is expanding, led by a leadership team filled with multiple home health and hospice veterans. In May, the company opened two new locations in Kentucky and Indiana, and the plan is to open up more locations in short order. As of right now, it has 14 locations spanning coast to coast, located in California, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Ohio, South Carolina, Florida and New Jersey. ... “I think there’s a lot of similarities [between PACE] and where hospice was in the ‘80s,” Russell Hilliard, the chief growth officer of BoldAge PACE, told Home Health Care News’ sister site Hospice News. ... Currently, there are 163 PACE organizations operating more than 300 centers, according to the National PACE Association. There are nearly 76,000 PACE participants across the country.

End-of-life talks, planning benefit all racial groups, study finds McKnights Long-Term Care News; by Kristen Fischer ... Having formal advanced care planning (ACP) in place was linked to higher odds of receiving care that aligned with individuals’ goals, the researchers found. The study evaluated how ACP and goal-concordant care (GCC) — an approach that aims to meet the patient’s goal and includes ACP and conversations about care goals —  affected people of different races. The report was published on May 18 in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society.  The framework is especially important for people in racial or ethnic minority populations who have a greater risk of poor end-of-life outcomes and don’t receive GCC. ... Older adults are more likely to receive hospice care at the end of life compared to previous decades, but a lot of people still report care that didn’t meet their preferences, the authors noted.

Optum Rx puts emphasis on predictability with new pricing model Fierce Healthcare; by Paige Minemyer; 5/20/24 Optum Rx is rolling out a new pharmacy model that seeks to make drug costs more predictable and transparent for clients. The Optum Rx Clear Trend Guarantee aligns guarantees into single per member cost, encompassing retail, home delivery, specialty drug and rebate components in one guarantee. It provides an alternative to Optum's Cost Made Clear offering, which includes pass-through models and cost-plus pricing. ... Clear Trend Guarantee will be available on Jan. 1 alongside the existing Cost Made Clear program, Optum said.

HHS puts $50M toward hospitals' ransomware fightBecker's Health IT; by Molly Gamble; 5/20/24A new agency within the National Institutes of Health is launching a $50 million initiative to develop tools for hospital IT teams that enhance their cybersecurity measures and resources to combat ransomware. On May 20, the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health introduced its Universal PatchinG and Remediation for Autonomous DEfense, or UPGRADE, program. "What if every hospital could autonomously protect itself and patients from cyber threats?" That is the guiding question for the initiative, which aims to develop a tailored and scalable software suite of remediations and patches for hospitals, reducing the patching time for vulnerable healthcare products to days or weeks.

Hospital-at-home grows despite regulatory uncertaintyModern Healthcare; by Diane Eastabrook; 5/17/24Health systems and technology companies are betting big on home-based hospital care, despite regulatory uncertainty about the program’s future. Hospitals are bullish on at-home acute care because it can save money and make more beds available in their facilities for sicker patients. Medicare also pays health systems the same rate as it would for an inpatient admission. Since January, two health systems and 16 hospitals launched hospital-at-home programs under the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services’ Acute Hospital Care at Home waiver, bringing the total number of programs to 336 across 37 states, according to the agency’s website. More programs are slated to launch this year as Congress considers whether to extend the waiver beyond its Dec. 31 expiration date. Hospital-at-home allows certain patients to receive acute-level care where they live through telehealth and in-person visits, supplemented with remote patient monitoring. The concept gained traction during the COVID-19 pandemic when CMS approved a waiver in 2020 to alleviate overcrowding in hospitals. Large health systems, including Mass General Brigham, Geisinger and the Cleveland Clinic have invested heavily in home-based acute care. Many smaller hospital systems are doing the same by leveraging in-home care technology.

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