Stephen Parodi, MD, discusses Advanced Care at Home Coalition’s support for delivering quality acute care at home

Stephen Parodi, MD, executive vice president of The Permanente Federation, discussed with Becker’s Health IT and other media the new Advanced Care at Home Coalition’s support for continuing care-at-home flexibilities stemming from the COVID-19 public health emergency and building a policy foundation for high-quality, hospital-level care at home.

“We’re hopeful that the public health emergency is going to be extended for some time so we don’t have a cliff when it comes to these programs, but we know that there’s going to need to be a bridge,” Dr. Parodi told Becker’s Health IT.

“We either need a legislative bridge to allow the principles of what the hospital-without-walls waivers have allowed us to do or, and probably just as important, work with the Center for Medicare & Medicaid Innovation … to develop essentially a demonstration program that would allow us to in a rigorous way examine the types of patients that are being admitted,” he said.

Leading health care providers have launched the Advanced Care at Home Coalition, a new advocacy effort focused on supporting the delivery of high-quality, hospital-level care at home during and after the COVID-19 public health emergency.

In May, Kaiser Permanente and Mayo Clinic announced a joint $100 million investment in Medically Home, a digital technology platform company that enables the coordination of acute-care-at-home services. The 3 organizations will be joined by hospital and health system members that include Adventist Health, ChristianaCare, Geisinger Health, Integris, Johns Hopkins Medicine, Michigan Medicine (University of Michigan), Novant Health, ProMedica, the Sharp Rees-Stealy Medical Group, UNC, and UnityPoint Health.

The coalition plans to build momentum by educating policymakers about advanced home care’s importance and benefits. Policymakers often want to be shown the data, as if to say, “Show me this improves care,” Dr. Parodi said in an interview with Healthcare IT News. “Show me that it’s more cost-neutral than current models.”

In an interview with Home Health Care News, Dr. Parodi said members of the coalition “think that it’s important that these programs are allowed to continue while we develop the appropriate guardrails and a measurement strategy for being able to put together a demonstration project. Then, we’d be able to show the value of these programs from a quality, safety, satisfaction, equity, and also financial perspective.”

Note: To read the entire articles see Becker’s Health IT, Healthcare IT News and Home Health Care News. See additional coverage in Fierce Healthcare and mHealthIntelligence.