By Chris Attaya December 11, 2025
Making the Cut with SHP: Strategies for Home Health Success in 2026

The CY 2026 Home Health Final Rule is official—and the news is better than expected. CMS reduced the proposed -6.4% cut to -1.3%, returning $915 million to the industry. But with inflation and rising wages, margins are still tight. Agencies that thrive in 2026 will be the ones using data to protect their bottom line.

Home Health
By Chris Attaya August 06, 2025
CMS Proposes Significant Changes for Home Health in CY 2026 Rule

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) recently released the CY 2026 Home Health proposed rule on June 30, 2025, introducing some major changes that Home Health Agencies (HHAs) are now reviewing and preparing to comment on. This rule proposes the largest payment cut since the Home Health Agency Prospective Payment System (HHA PPS) began in CY 2000. CMS is suggesting a reimbursement cut of 6.4%, or $1.135 billion.

Home Health , In the Press ,
July 18, 2025
SHP Announces 2024 Best-of-the-Best Winners

The annual SHPBest™ award program was created to recognize home health and hospice providers that consistently provide outstanding performance in patient and caregiver satisfaction. SHP would like to congratulate the 2024 SHP Best-of-the-Best winners, who have been acknowledged for achieving the highest overall HHCAHPS patient satisfaction or CAHPS Hospice caregiver satisfaction scores of all eligible SHP clients during the 2024 calendar year.

Home Health , Hospice , Company News ,
By Chris Attaya April 18, 2025
HHVBP – Managing under the new 2025 measure set

As of March 31st, Home Health Agencies (HHAs) have three months of quality episodes completed using the new Performance Year (PY) 2025 measure set of the Expanded Home Health Value-based Purchasing (HHVBP) program. How is your HHA performing? It is not as easy as looking at your past HHVBP performances as there is some significant changes with PY 2025. CMS not only changed the number of measures from 12 to 10 (deleted 5, added in 3), many of the measure weightings were adjusted, and the baseline year was changed from CY 2022 to CY 2023 reflecting more current outcome data. CMS did keep the ratio of measure weights across the OASIS/Claims/HHCAHPS categories the same at 35%/35%/30% respectively.

Home Health
By Kim Banker December 20, 2024
Recognizing the Importance of Oral Meds

As we draw closer to 2025, have you considered the huge impact Improvement in Management of Oral Medications (Oral Meds) will have in the upcoming year? Oral Meds play an integral part in all Home Health Quality Programs (HHQRP). Let’s break down each one and discuss best practices to ensure accuracy.

Home Health
July 24, 2024
SHP Announces 2023 Best-of-the-Best Winners

The annual SHPBest™ award program was created to recognize home health and hospice providers that consistently provide outstanding performance in patient and caregiver satisfaction. SHP would like to congratulate the 2023 SHP Best-of-the-Best winners, who have been acknowledged for achieving the highest overall HHCAHPS patient satisfaction or CAHPS Hospice caregiver satisfaction scores of all eligible SHP clients during the 2023 calendar year.

Home Health , Hospice ,
By Kim Banker July 24, 2024
Breaking Down Discharge Function Score (DFS) for Home Health

With the new Discharge Function Score measure now included in SHP reports, many have asked “What do we do at the agency level?” One of the most impactful things you can do is to educate your staff about the new measure. In order to understand why DFS is important, let them know it’s a part of Home Health Value Based Purchasing (HHVBP). A simplified way of educating your staff about HHVBP is to explain that reimbursement is tied to the quality of care we provide to our patients. DFS accounts for a significant amount weighing in at 20%.

Home Health
By Chris Attaya June 26, 2024
Initial Medicare FFS Telehealth Insights

On July 1st, 2023 CMS began requiring home health agencies to document their utilization of telehealth services on their Medicare Fee-For-Service (FFS) claims. As finalized in the CY 2023 Home Health Payment System Rate Update, agencies are responsible to identify one of three services they provide using new Healthcare Common Procedure Coding System (HCPCS) codes. These codes are added as a separate visit line on the claim based on the date each service is provided. CMS notes in the rule that these services are for reporting only, since CMS does not reimburse for these services. The HCPCS codes are:

Home Health , In the Press ,
By Chris Attaya March 28, 2024
PDGM after 4 years – No Big Surprises

Now that CY 2023 is closed and we await the CMS CY 2025 proposed rule for home health, it is an opportune time to revisit the data trends in the Patient Driven Groupings Model (PDGM) by leveraging SHP national benchmarks. Delving into these insights, one can discern intriguing patterns that have emerged over the years. To no one’s surprise, Home Health Agency (HHA) Medicare visits per 30-day period have continued to decrease over the first four years of PDGM.

Home Health
By Chris Attaya January 16, 2024
OASIS-E1 Instrument is Released with Little Fanfare

In the first week of January 2024, CMS quietly announced the release of the latest draft of OASIS version E1. The subdued announcement can be attributed to the limited updates planned for the tool, set to take effect on January 1, 2025. CMS has mentioned that the accompanying OASIS-E1 manual will be made available at a later date.

Home Health
By Chris Attaya November 21, 2023
Discharge Function Scores: Insights into the HH Final Rule's Impact on HHVBP and HHQRP

The recently published Medicare and Medicaid CY 2024 Home Health Prospective Payment System Rate Final Rule, documented in the Federal Register on November 13th, solidifies significant shifts in the Home Health Value-Based Purchasing Program (HH VBP) and Home Health Quality Reporting Program (HH QRP). Despite input from industry stakeholders, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) held firm on their proposed changes.

Home Health
By Chris Attaya November 14, 2023
CMS Continues to Kick the Temporary Behavioral Adjustment Can Ahead

In the recent release of the Medicare and Medicaid CY 2024 Home Health Prospective Payment System Rate Final Rule, CMS finalized the PDGM permanent behavioral adjustment. Originally proposed as a 5.779% cut, CMS decided to phase in the reduction, with only half of the rate being adjusted in CY 24. This mirrors the approach taken in the previous year, where the proposed permanent behavioral cut was also halved.

Home Health
October 12, 2023
NAHC and SHP to Co-sponsor BerryDunn's Home Health and Hospice Patient and Family Satisfaction Project

BerryDunn is pleased to announce that the National Association for Home Care and Hospice (NAHC) has joined the firm in launching a research study and quality improvement project aimed at helping home health and hospice agencies improve patient and family satisfaction. In addition, Strategic Health Programs (SHP), a leading data analytics and benchmarking company, will play a pivotal role in facilitating streamlining data for the project.

Home Health , Hospice ,
August 24, 2023
SHP announces 2022 Best-of-the-Best winners

The annual SHPBest™ award program was created to recognize home health and hospice providers that consistently provide outstanding performance in patient and caregiver satisfaction. SHP would like to congratulate the 2022 SHP Best-of-the-Best winners, who have been acknowledged for achieving the highest overall HHCAHPS patient satisfaction or CAHPS Hospice caregiver satisfaction scores of all eligible SHP clients during the 2022 calendar year.

Home Health , Hospice ,
By Chris Attaya July 07, 2023
Medicare Rate Cuts to Reduce Home Health Reimbursement 2.2% in CY 2024

The proposed CMS Home Health Prospective Payment System Rate Update was released on Friday, June 30th in advance of the official posting to the Federal Register on July 10th. CMS is proposing an overall 2.2% rate cut that includes a market basket increase of 3.0% (less a productivity adjustment of .3%) along with a 5.65% cut due to permanent behavioral adjustments in switching from PPS to PDGM. Since the CY 2023 rulemaking reflected only half of the permanent behavioral cuts (using data from CY 2020 and CY 2021), CMS is proposing to implement the second half of the CY 2023 cut along with another 1.51% to account for behavioral changes recognized in CY 2022.

Home Health
By Chris Attaya February 07, 2023
HHVBP National Expansion Started January 1st – How is my agency performing?

In the Medicare and Medicaid CY 2022 Home Health Prospective Payment System Rate Final Rule, CMS finalized the Home Health Value-Based Program (HHVBP) national expansion based on their original proposal. However, there is one exception - a one year delay in implementing the program. This is good news for providers in the 41 states which are currently not part of the CMMI HHVBP demonstration, but agencies are still expected to use this time to prepare.

Home Health
By Chris Attaya November 07, 2022
Home Health CY 2023 Final Rule Provides Rate Relief

In the Medicare and Medicaid CY 2023 Home Health Prospective Payment System Rate Final Rule, CMS finalized the PDGM permanent behavioral adjustment of 7.85% to be phased in with only half of the rate being adjusted in CY 23. Including the higher revised market basket adjustment of 4.1%, reduced by the productivity adjustment of .1%, CMS is predicting HHAs revenues to increase by 0.7% or $125 million in CY 2023 compared to CY 2022. This compares to the proposed rule where payment rates would decrease by 4.2% or $810 million.

Home Health
By Chris Attaya July 08, 2022
Medicare Rate Cuts to Reduce Home Health Reimbursement 4.2% in CY 2023

The proposed CMS Home Health Prospective Payment System Rate Update was posted to the Federal Register on June 23rd, a bit earlier in the annual rule-making cycle than the past several years. As part of the overall reimbursement cuts, CMS is proposing a 7.69% rate cut to reflect their calculations on behavioral adjustments. These adjustments are intended to account for the actual vs assumed behavior changes on aggregate expenditures due to the switch from HH PPS to PDGM. Keep in mind this is a prospective rate cut starting in CY 2023, and does not address the overpayments from CY 2020 and CY 2021. CMS has requested comments on how to recoup these overpayments.

Home Health
June 13, 2022
SHP announces 2021 Best-of-the-Best winners

The annual SHPBest™ award program was created to recognize home health and hospice providers that consistently provide outstanding performance in patient and caregiver satisfaction. SHP would like to congratulate the 2021 SHP Best-of-the-Best winners, who have been acknowledged for achieving the highest overall HHCAHPS patient satisfaction or CAHPS Hospice caregiver satisfaction scores of all eligible SHP clients during the 2021 calendar year.

Home Health , Hospice ,
By Chris Attaya March 31, 2022
OASIS-E – One Step Closer

CMS has moved forward with getting final approvals in updating the Home Health OASIS assessment version from ‘D1’ to ‘E’ effective next January 1, 2023. CMS is required to get approval from the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) as part of the process. As part of their information packet, CMS provided an OASIS change table, a revised OASIS-E form and an itemized list of each data element, along with their assumptions of estimated costs to implement. The estimate for the time clinicians will need to complete the 143 net changed data elements (see chart) will cost $340.9M annually with another $23.4M in one-time trainings.

Home Health
By Chris Attaya January 11, 2022
PDGM Turns Two

The Medicare PDGM Prospective Payment System for Home Health recognized its second birthday on January 1st of this year. With two years of real-time data, I was interested in comparing the PDGM components and other key indicators to see how the second year compared to the first using the SHP National Database and the CMS CY 2022 Final Rule datasets. CMS also updated the Case-Mix Weights (CMWs) for each of the 432 Home Health Resource Groups (HHRGs) based on their analysis of CY 2020 claims (run as of July 12th, 2021). They used a four-step regression model that applied CY 2019 costs per visit (minutes) and non-routine supplies from claims to determine average resource use and the corresponding CMWs.

Home Health
December 14, 2021
SHP releases OASIS-D1 to OASIS-E Crosswalk Guide

With the OASIS-E assessment form going into effect on January 1st, 2023, SHP is pleased to provide home health agencies with a complete side-by-side comparison of the OASIS-D1 and expected OASIS-E assessment forms. Items that have been added or removed between the two OASIS versions are indicated with color coding.

Home Health
By Chris Attaya November 18, 2021
CMS Home Health Final Rule delays HHVBP National Expansion

In the Medicare and Medicaid CY 2022 Home Health Prospective Payment System Rate Final Rule, CMS finalized the Home Health Value-Based Program (HHVBP) national expansion based on their original proposal. However, there is one exception - a one year delay in implementing the program. This is good news for providers in the 41 states which are currently not part of the CMMI HHVBP demonstration, but agencies are still expected to use this time to prepare.

Home Health
By Chris Attaya August 11, 2021
CMS HH Proposed Rule Punts PDGM Behavioral Change Adjustments Again

The Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) issued the CY 2022 Home Health (HH) Prospective Payment Rate proposed rule in the Federal Register last month and all eyes were focused on whether they would propose any rate adjustments based on changes in coding or other behaviors due to the implementation of the Patient-Driven Groupings Model (PDGM). Although CMS suggests that they have overpaid HH up to 6% compared to the prior PPS model, CMS kicked the can ahead again in the 2022 proposed rule.

Home Health
April 14, 2021
SHP supports the National Healthcare at Home 2021 Best Practices and Future Insights Study

SHP is excited to be supporting the National Healthcare at Home 2021 Best Practices and Future Insights Study. Expected to be the most comprehensive study on the delivery of care at home to date, results will include best practices on the topics of staffing, reimbursement, new care delivery models, palliative care, and more. In order for the study to succeed we need your participation!

Home Health , Company News ,
By Chris Attaya December 02, 2020
Initial COVID-19 Results Under Medicare PDGM

Effective April 1st 2020, CMS embraced the new ICD-10 code (U07.1) by adding it to the MMTA-Respiratory Clinical Group to reimburse home health agencies for these patients. I was curious to see how the PDGM model aligned specifically to these patients. Read more to see how frequently COVID-19 was utilized as a primary diagnosis code in Medicare PDGM 30-day period starts, and how COVID-19 patients compare to the SHP national database in regards to Comorbidity Adjustments and Functional Impairment. Also a look at Source and Timing attributes of COVID-19 stays, along with case-mix weights, and LUPA rates.

Home Health
By Chris Attaya November 17, 2020
CY 2021 Home Health Final Rule Behavioral Adjustment as Proposed

CMS published the CY 2021 Home Health Payment System Rate final rule on November 4th. As it stands, all of the PDGM methodology, the Behavioral Adjustments level, LUPA thresholds and case-mix weights will be kept the same in CY 2021 as they were in the first year of PDGM. With another quarter of data under our belts and with the better understanding and management of COVID-19, Chris Attaya takes a look at several areas of expected PDGM behavioral changes.

Home Health
By Chris Attaya October 13, 2020
CMS Announces Home Health Data Frozen Until 2022

CMS recently announced that data displayed on the Home Health Compare (HHC) website will remain the same until January of 2022. That does not mean Home Health agencies should get complacent however. Performance now will affect future scores. In order to manage quality scores, home health agencies and hospices need access to real-time scores to guide and enhance their quality improvement programs.

Home Health
By Chris Attaya July 22, 2020
PDGM will stay the course

What does CMS have in store for the Home Health (HH) industry in CY 2021? PDGM will stay the course, good news for most agencies, whose operations have been mired with the impacts of COVID-19. Looking at the SHP National database for the first six months compared to the CMS PDGM model, there are clearly some behavioral changes that we are beginning to observe. Changes related to comorbidity adjustment, functional impairment, and LUPA rates are highlighted in the blog.

Home Health
July 06, 2020
SHP announces 2019 Best-of-the-Best winners

The annual SHPBest™ award program was created to recognize home health and hospice providers that consistently provide outstanding performance in patient and caregiver satisfaction. SHP would like to congratulate the 2019 SHP Best-of-the-Best winners, who have been acknowledged for achieving the highest overall HHCAHPS patient satisfaction or CAHPS Hospice caregiver satisfaction scores of all eligible SHP clients during the 2019 calendar year.

Home Health , Hospice ,
By Chris Attaya May 08, 2020
OASIS-E is delayed due to COVID-19

Last week, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) announced in their Interim Final with Comment Rule a delay in the implementation of OASIS-E which was slated to begin on January 1, 2021. This is good news for Home Health Agencies (HHAs) that have been consumed with the impact of COVID-19 as part of the Public Health Emergency (PHE).

Home Health
By Chris Attaya March 26, 2020
CMS OASIS-E is closer to reality

On March 18, 2020 the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) announced that the draft OASIS-E instrument is now available on their OASIS Data Sets webpage. All clinical assessments will use the new tool as of January 1, 2021. As part of the IMPACT Act, CMS has been updating OASIS data elements to enable post-acute care (PAC) providers to report standardized patient assessment data, new quality measures, and data on resource utilization. The intent is interoperability which allows for the exchange of data using common standards and definitions, facilitates coordinated care, and improves outcomes for Medicare beneficiaries.

Home Health
By Chris Attaya February 04, 2020
Star Ratings will not be painful anymore

CMS has begun the process to remove the measure, Frequency of Pain Interfering with Patients Activities or Movement (“Pain”) from the Home Health Quality Reporting Program (HH QRP), as part of an effort to address the national Opioid crises. The Pain measure will no longer be publicly reported on HHC, Star Ratings, CASPER reporting, or any other QAPI program. How might this affect your star ratings? Read on.

Home Health
January 13, 2020
New PDGM Period and Stay Detail reports released

SHP is pleased to announce a new suite of financial reporting to help home health agencies improve efficiency and maximize margin under the PDGM. The new PDGM Stay Detail and Period Detail reports show patient data within PDGM Core Categories at the home health stay level, and at the 30-day payment period level. They help guide visit utilization management, LUPA tracking, margin analysis, efficiency of functional improvement, and much more.

Home Health , Product Update ,
January 13, 2020
SHP’s HHRG Worksheet redesigned for PDGM

SHP is pleased to announce the release of our completely redesigned HHRG Worksheet tool. Since HHRGs have been completely overhauled with PDGM, SHP has took the opportunity to re-engineer the report to support the new payment rules and highlight potential revenue opportunities within the PDGM components. It is designed to explore the variety of factors which contribute to the HHRG score for patients. It provides a complete look into the HHRG, Case Mix Weight, and the Total Revenue for the payment period.

Home Health , Product Update ,
January 13, 2020
SHP’s treasured Episode Einstein℠ report enhanced for PDGM

Our most heavily utilized report, Episode Einstein℠, just got a major upgrade to support the new payment model. Compare multiple assessments in a home health patient’s stay to monitor patient progress and improvement opportunities. The marriage of clinical and financial details make this a great case conference tool.

Home Health , Product Update ,
By Chris Attaya January 09, 2020
PDGM has arrived – Coding not so much!

Finally, after a couple of years of preparation and anticipation, the Patient-Driven Groupings Model (PDGM) is underway. It’s a little early to get a read on how agencies are doing under PDGM, but one area I was curious about was how much agencies improved on coding “unacceptable” diagnoses (formerly known as Questionable Encounters, or QEs).

Home Health
By Chris Attaya November 07, 2019
CMS releases Home Health Final Rule: Behavioral adjustments cut in half

The CY 2020 Home Health Payment System Rate final rule was published last week and, as expected, the Patient-Driven Groupings Model (PDGM) will be implemented for 30-day periods of care starting on or after January 1, 2020. The good news is that CMS reduced the behavioral adjustment to 4.36%, just over half of the revised 8.39% estimates. Read our blog for highlights on the final rule, plus insights and predictions for what's to come.

Home Health
October 30, 2019
PDGM Preview Report Released

SHP is pleased to announce the release of the PDGM Preview report to help home health agencies prepare for the January 1st, 2020 implementation of the Patient-Driven Groupings Model (PDGM). The PDGM Preview report provides a view into your 2019 payment episode information, as applied to PDGM 30-day payment periods, and grouped by HHRG. The report includes period breakouts by distribution, visit information, and LUPA rates, with state and national benchmarks.

Home Health , Product Update ,
September 19, 2019
SHP releases new PDGM feature: Unacceptable Diagnosis Alert

SHP is pleased to announce the release of a new Unacceptable Diagnosis Alert to help home health agencies prepare for coding requirement changes under PDGM. Come January 1st, 2020 primary diagnosis codes will be categorized as either “acceptable” or “unacceptable”. Our new alert will notify users whenever an unacceptable primary diagnosis code is entered. This will help agencies train their staff now to be ready for PDGM and avoid the delays and lost time associated with claim rejection and recoding.

Home Health , Product Update ,
By Chris Attaya July 10, 2019
Goodbye “Questionable Encounter”, Hello “Unacceptable Diagnosis”!

In the CY 2019 Home Health Prospective System Rule Update, CMS finalized the ICD-10 codes that would be “acceptable” to use as a primary diagnosis code under the Patient-Driven Groupings Model (PDGM). The term "Questionable Encounters" (QE) was absent from the proposed and final rules, now there is only “acceptable” or “unacceptable” codes. Learn more and see whether SHP agencies are already phasing out unacceptable codes.

Home Health
June 13, 2019
SHP announces 2018 Best-of-the-Best winners

The annual SHPBest™ recognition program was created to acknowledge home health and hospice providers that consistently provide high quality service. SHP would like to congratulate the 2018 SHP Best-of-the-Best winners, who have been recognized for achieving the highest overall HHCAHPS patient satisfaction or CAHPS Hospice caregiver satisfaction scores of all eligible SHP clients during the 2018 calendar year.

Home Health , Hospice ,
By Chris Attaya May 29, 2019
PDGM Insights are in the Period Details

The home health industry is six months away from the new Patient-Driven Grouping Model (PDGM). There is a lot of educational content available to help agencies prepare but much of it reports on PDGM metrics and payments using average values. Using 30-day periods as an overall average can be misleading. It is more meaningful to break out this data into the sequence of periods across groupings like clinical category. In this way one can analyze the impacts of periods to help define the clinical and operational improvements necessary to manage your agencies under PDGM.

Home Health
February 13, 2019
SHP enhances its risk of hospitalization model, helps agencies better prevent hospitalizations

Given the significant role that hospitalization rates play in publicly reported scores, star ratings, and value-based purchasing calculations, preventing unplanned hospitalizations is one of the top priorities for home health agencies. To ensure that our clients have the best possible tools to identify patients that are at risk of being hospitalized and help prevent unplanned hospitalizations, SHP has released a major update to our acute care hospitalization risk model.

Home Health
By Chris Attaya January 18, 2019
SHP’s CareStat aims to alleviate “Difficult Decisions About Post-Acute Care"

An informative report from the United Hospital Fund described the overly complex process patients and their families go through to navigate Post-Acute Care (PAC) options such as skilled nursing facilities (SNF) and home health agencies (HHA) after a hospital stay. SHP's CareStat product addresses current challenges with transitioning care by providing hospitals and ACOs with real-time home quality and patient data.

Home Health , Hospitals/ACOs ,
By Chris Attaya December 03, 2018
PDGM recalibrates revenues in budget neutral manner

Now that we know the Patient-Driven Groupings Model (PDGM) will officially start January 1, 2020, it’s time to dig a little deeper into understanding how the case-mix weights of the 432 PDGM groups were established.

Home Health
By Chris Attaya November 08, 2018
CMS releases Home Health Final Rule: PDGM Starts in CY 2020

The CY 2019 Home Health Payment System Rate final rule was published last week and, as expected, the Patient-Driven Groupings Model (PDGM) will be implemented for 30-day periods of care starting on or after January 1, 2020. In our blog we provide a summary of changes to the model, such as the expansion of clinical groups from six to twelve, as well as home health PPS Case-mix updates and significant HHVBP changes confirmed in the final rule.

Home Health
September 19, 2018
SHP Releases New Hospitalization Patient Detail Report

We are excited to announce the release of the Hospitalization Patient Detail report to our SHP for Agencies customers. This powerful new report provides a complete picture of the home-health stay for any patient, including: hospitalization risk, transfer history, and discharge details, with one row of data for each SOC/ROC to any available Transfer/Discharge. Also included are indicators for 30-Day Rehospitalizations, 60-Day Hospitalizations, Emergent Care, Hospitalization outcome details, and more.

Home Health , Product Update ,
By Chris Attaya September 18, 2018
CMS Proposes to Overhaul HHVBP

In the CY 2018 Home Health Proposed Rule, CMS is dramatically changing the scoring methodology for the pilot program known as the Home Health Value-based Purchasing Program (HHVBP). What is striking to me is that these changes are being made during the fourth year of the five-year program, where up to 7% of Medicare revenues are at risk.

Home Health
By Chris Attaya September 05, 2018
CMS Home Health Proposed Rule shares PDGM winners and losers

In the CY 2019 Home Health Proposed Rule, CMS shared a level of detail not seen before – an agency specific list of how agencies will fare under the changes they are proposing. Wow. CMS shared the agency revenue impacts of the Patient-Driven Groupings Model (PDGM) versus the current 153-group PPS reimbursement revenue. The range of the revenue impact is quite wide. Looking at the SHP national database for CY 2017, about 17% of the 3.6MM payment episodes in our database had a primary diagnosis code that would be considered a QE under PDGM.

Home Health
August 28, 2018
Brightree incorporates SHP's OASIS Integrated Alerting into their iPad point-of-care app

SHP is pleased to announce Brightree recently incorporated our OASIS Integrated Alerting functionality into their iPad point-of-care app. This enhancement gives our joint customers the tools they need to improve speed and efficiency, while continuously providing high-quality care to patients.

Home Health , Company News ,
August 14, 2018
SHP releases OASIS-C2 to OASIS-D Crosswalk Guide

With the OASIS-D assessment form going into effect on January 1st, 2019, SHP is pleased to provide home health agencies with a complete side-by-side comparison of the OASIS-C2 and expected OASIS-D assessment forms. This easy-to-follow guide is an excellent reference for anyone who works with OASIS Assessments and will improve accuracy, help reduce coding errors, and potentially reduce the number of returned claims.

Home Health
August 02, 2018
SHP announces 2017 Best-of-the-Best winners

The annual SHPBest recognition program was created to acknowledge home health and hospice providers that consistently provide high quality service. SHP would like to congratulate the 2017 SHP Best-of-the-Best winners, who have been recognized for achieving the highest overall HHCAHPS patient satisfaction or CAHPS Hospice caregiver satisfaction scores of all eligible SHP clients during the 2017 calendar year.

Home Health , Hospice ,
By Chris Attaya July 23, 2018
Home Health CY 2019 Proposed Rule warms over HHGM

July usually starts the month off with fireworks, but this year the proposed rule was issued on July 2nd with its own bang at just under 600 pages. The big news - Home Health Groupings Model (HHGM) is now the Patient-Driven Groupings Model (PDGM). Below are a few other highlights from the proposed rule related to the Home Health Value Based Purchasing (HHVBP) program, Home Health Quality Reporting Program (HHQRP), new Home Infusion Benefit and the changing HH PPS case-mix weights (CMW).

Home Health
By Chris Attaya July 09, 2018
CMS announces new star rating algorithm

CMS announced on their Medicare Learning Network (MLN) national call a proposed change to the Quality of Patient Care (QoPC) Star Ratings starting next year. CMS has proposed to eliminate the “Drug Education on all Medications Provided to Patient/Caregiver” measure and add the “Improvement in Management of Oral Medications” measure to the QoPC algorithm. What seems to be overlooked with these subtle changes is how often Star Ratings by provider change each quarter.

Home Health
By Chris Attaya June 05, 2018
Home Health Value-Based Purchasing – What scores should I be shooting for?

With the second performance year (CY 2017) of HHVBP over, I wanted to see how the year over year measure outcomes changed across our SHP national database. Comparing the same agencies year over year it appears both HHVBP states and Non-VBP states improved about the same on their average outcomes and process measure scores with little change in the HHCAHPS scores. Notice that with a few exceptions, VBP agencies had better outcomes than their non-VBP state agency peers. I expect CMS has noticed that too. In deciding what scores you want to target, it is best to know what percentile rank you want to realistically achieve.

Home Health
May 09, 2018
Mention of SHP as integral partner to Amedisys as they expand their care across the continuum

Amedisys has been steadily expanding their breadth of care into markets across the continuum. Part of the company’s strategy of adding personal care services to improve care involves enhancing overall capabilities through new technologies. In 2016 Amedisys announced it would partner with Strategic Healthcare Programs (SHP) to help achieve this goal.

Home Health , Company News ,
By Chris Attaya March 06, 2018
CMS Open Door Forum concludes a busy news month

On February 28th CMS ended the month hosting their regular Home Health Open Door Forum with some very notable updates to the home care industry. With little fanfare and during the Q&A portion, CMS responded to a question regarding the timing of the new OASIS forms as OASIS-D!

Home Health
By Chris Attaya December 24, 2017
CMS confirms changes to Quality of Patient Care (QoPC) Star Ratings

At their December 14th HH QRP webinar, CMS announced the deletion of the Influenza Immunization Received for Current Flu Season measure from the algorithm in calculating the home health Quality of Patient Care (QoPC) Star ratings. CMS made this after the month-long comment period ended in November 2017. The change will take effect in the April 2018 Home Health Compare (HHC) refresh.

Home Health
By Chris Attaya November 07, 2017
HHGM is not finalized — but here are the final rule changes you still need to know

The CY 2018 Home Health Payment System Rate final rule was published last week and CMS announced the news the industry was hoping to read – “We are not finalizing the implementation of the Home Health Groupings Model (HHGM) in this final rule.” Below are a few other highlights from the final rule related to the Home Health Value Based Purchasing (HHVBP) program, Home Health Quality Reporting Program (HHQRP) and the changing HH PPS case-mix weights (CMW).

Home Health
October 16, 2017
Agencies boost referrals by marketing the quality of care they provide

Republished with permission from Decision Health. Article originally published on Home Health Line October 16, 2016. Whether they’re discussing QAPI, 5-star ratings or rehospitalization rates in general, more and more agencies are showcasing their quality of care when they market to referral sources, a new HHL survey shows.

Home Health , Company News ,
By Chris Attaya August 15, 2017
What’s next – OASIS-C3 or OASIS-D?

The big news in the latest proposed rule for HH PPS was the Home Health Groupings Model (HHGM). Along with the typical recalibration to case-mix payments and case weights, did you see the significant proposals regarding the Home Health Quality Reporting Program (HH QRP)? Almost a third of the 389 pages in the rule were in regard to the HH QRP.

Home Health
By Chris Attaya July 31, 2017
Home Health Groupings Model (HHGM) is Here

The Home Health Groupings Model (HHGM), which is the most significant change to the home health prospective payment reimbursement model since its inception, was finally released on Thursday, July 28th as part of the Home Health Payment Proposed Rule for CY 2018, although it is not scheduled to be implemented until CY 2019.

Home Health
July 27, 2017
SHP Announces 2016 Best-of-the-Best Winners

The annual SHPBest recognition program was created to acknowledge home health and hospice providers that consistently provide high quality service. We are pleased to announce the 2016 SHP Best-of-the-Best winners, who have been recognized for achieving the highest overall HHCAHPS patient satisfaction or CAHPS Hospice caregiver satisfaction scores of all eligible SHP clients during the 2016 calendar year.

Home Health , Hospice ,
July 11, 2017
SHP and Brightree Improve Quality of Patient Care and Reimbursement

Brightree LLC, a leading provider of cloud-based software, and Strategic Healthcare Programs (SHP), a leading provider of data analytics and benchmarking to post-acute care providers, have released Integrated Alerting to further enhance the existing interface between two companies.

Home Health , Company News , Product Update ,
May 25, 2017
How Home Health Can Win the Readmissions Numbers Game

Home Health Care News publishes: How Home Health Can Win the Readmissions Numbers Game, using SHP's data & insights gained from recent webinar presented by SHP.

Home Health
By Chris Attaya February 02, 2017
Home Health Payment Groupings Model is gaining momentum

On January 18th, CMS presented a slideshow through their Medicare Learnings Network on a possible new payment refinement to home health care reimbursement called the Home Health Groupings Model (HHGM). This was the second call in six months where Abt Associates, CMS’ contractor, shared the HHGM background in addition to the 178 page technical report they issued in November 2016. This sure seems to be picking up speed.

Home Health
February 02, 2017
Amedisys uses SHP benchmark data in pilot program to lower readmissions, empower patients

After seeing promising preliminary results, our customer Amedisys is expanding a pilot program that aims to lower overall costs through fewer readmissions. The outcomes from the pilot and future results from the program will be evaluated against Strategic Healthcare Programs' (SHP) benchmark data on 3 metrics: hospital readmission rates, functional status of the patient and shortness of breath.

Home Health , Company News ,
By Chris Attaya November 07, 2016
Home Health Final Rule confirms Home Health Value-Based Purchasing (HHVBP) as proposed

CMS issued the Final CY 2017 Home Health PPS Rate Update in the Federal Register on November 3rd. All of the proposals to update the VBP program were finalized with no changes regardless of stakeholder comments, except for one...

Home Health
By Chris Attaya September 15, 2016
Home Health Proposed Rule comment period closed August 26th – Now we wait

With provider and industry comments now in, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) will take the next 60 days to evaluate and make any suggested changes in the Home Health CY 2017 Final Rule.

Home Health
By Chris Attaya July 18, 2016
Home Health Proposed Rule updates Home Health Value-Based Purchasing (HHVBP)

Value-Based Purchasing: CMS says “No” to 4 new measures.

Home Health
June 10, 2016
Next generation of SHP's Scorecard Suite has been released

"We developed the new Scorecard Report Suite so that our customers can make better business decisions and improve their performance more quickly," said Rob Paulsson, President of SHP.

Home Health , Product Update ,
May 31, 2016
SHP releases OASIS-C1 to OASIS-C2 Crosswalk Guide

SHP is pleased to provide you with a complete side-by-side comparison of the OASIS-C1 and OASIS-C2 assessment forms.

Home Health
By Chris Attaya March 31, 2016
Flu vaccine window is closing…or is it?

With March coming to a close, it is important to intensify your efforts so that patients whose episodes start before the end of the month have access to the flu vaccine.

Home Health
By Chris Attaya March 10, 2016
Quality Star Ratings up for Refinements

CMS recently announced they were establishing a new technical expert panel (TEP) to review the Quality of Patient Care Star Ratings.

Home Health
By Chris Attaya February 05, 2016
In a recent Home Health Line article SHP’s Chris Attaya weighs in on agencies best opportunities for improvement with CMS programs

Republished with permission from Decision Health. Article originally published on Home Health Line January 11, 2016. The list of quality measures for home health CMS may ultimately use to help determine payments to agencies just grew six measures longer.

Home Health , Company News ,
February 05, 2016
Shout out to SHP in the latest Home Health Line issue

In the latest issue of Home Health Line (1/18/2016), Lynette Godhard, director of clinical operations, chief privacy and organizational integrity officer for Adventist Home Health in Silver Spring, Md., discusses the agency plans for this year.

Home Health , Company News ,
By Chris Attaya January 09, 2016
CMS Home Health Value-Based Purchasing Q&A – Finally Some Answers

On December 31st, CMS released their first Q&A on the CMS website, and in doing so provided some key information.

Home Health
By Chris Attaya November 23, 2015
Value Based Purchasing - Agencies Need More Information

Earlier this month CMS provided many updates with the release of the 2016 final rule and Value-Based Purchasing program. However, home health agencies are still waiting for vital information they need to determine their agency’s overall quality.

Home Health
November 11, 2015
SHP Releases Two New Home Health Star Rating Reports

With the addition of Star Ratings to Home Health Compare this year, agencies now have an indicator of overall clinical quality.

Home Health , Product Update ,
September 17, 2015
SHP Announces ICD-10 Readiness and Product Improvements

By configuring our product in the new ICD-10 coding environment, we hope that our customers can continue to deliver the best clinical outcomes and get properly reimbursed for their hard work.

Home Health , Company News , Product Update ,
By Chris Attaya September 11, 2015
Value Based Purchasing – What is my target?

One of the sections in the Home Health Proposed Rule outlines how Home Health Value Based Purchasing (HHVBP) total performance scores will be calculated. Both sets of calculations are derived using base year scores. Thus the quandary...

Home Health
By Chris Attaya August 05, 2015
CMS Continues to Surprise

The Home Health Proposed Rule was posted by CMS on the Federal Register July 10th and it was full of surprises, especially in light of the much anticipated proposal on Value Based Purchasing (VBP).

Home Health
By Chris Attaya July 09, 2015
July is Heating Up

It’s going to be a busy month. The Home Health Proposed Rule was just issued and the new Home Health Compare measures for 30-day readmissions and Quality of Patient Care star ratings, along with the PEPPER reports are all scheduled to be released.

Home Health
By Chris Attaya July 01, 2015
First Quarter Results are in… Case Weights are Down, Revenue is Up!

I was curious to see how the Medicare case-mix weights and revenue were impacted, relative to the Home Health Final Rule published on November 6, 2014.

Home Health
June 22, 2015
Updates to Clinical Executive Advantage Report for Home Health Released

As one of our most popular reports, the Clinical Executive Advantage serves as a starting point for high level data analysis across a wide spectrum of clinically oriented home health quality metrics.

Home Health , Product Update ,
By Chris Attaya June 08, 2015
Just when you thought it was safe to go outside…

CMS announced an additional set of Star Ratings for HHCAHPS.

Home Health
By Chris Attaya May 21, 2015
PEPPER is Coming to Home Care

CMS is introducing new reports as an educational tool for Home Health Care in July 2015.

Home Health
By Chris Attaya May 11, 2015
30-Day Readmits - A Deeper Dive into CHF Trends

I was curious to see how rehospitalization rates have been changing over the last several years. With CHF widely being touted by CMS as one of the diagnosis categories with high avoidable readmissions, I figured I would start there.

Home Health
By Chris Attaya April 14, 2015
Star Ratings for Home Health - How do you rate?

CMS made the Star Rating Preview Reports available within the last two weeks. Where does your agency fall in the ratings?

Home Health
March 25, 2015
Reminder: The 2016 HHCAHPS Exemption Deadline is Approaching - 3/31/2015

There's still time to submit a Participation Exemption Request, but not much!

Home Health
By Barbara Rosenblum February 11, 2015
Multiple Problems Plague Home Health Star Rating

What’s not to love about CMS’ star rating system for home health? Plenty.

Home Health
By Barbara Rosenblum January 26, 2015
Five-Star Rating Reflects Quality as “One” Score and Deserves Immediate Attention!

With CMS’s proposed Five-Star quality rating system, overall quality will be depicted as one score, ranging from one to five stars.

Home Health
December 30, 2014
SHP Releases New HHRG Worksheet

To help Home Health agencies navigate the changing PPS landscape, SHP has released a new version of the popular HHRG Worksheet.

Home Health , Product Update ,
By Barbara Rosenblum December 08, 2014
OASIS-C1 Reimbursement Comparison (Complementary Tool)

As you reach the final stages of your OASIS-C1 preparations, take a moment to double check your processes and ensure you are ready for the 2015 PPS changes. A lot is changing in how case mix points and HHRG scores are calculated and there are some simple tools available to help you understand these changes and maybe make your New Year a little brighter.

Home Health
By Barbara Rosenblum November 24, 2014
OASIS Likely Here for the Long Haul

Rumors have been circulating that come 2019, all patient assessment documents would utilize one instrument.

Home Health
November 12, 2014
SHP and Delta Health Technologies Release Next Generation Data Interface and Bring Enhanced Efficiency to Mutual Clients

Clients using the Delta Crescendo software now have access to a new style of SHP interface!

Home Health , Company News ,
By Barbara Rosenblum October 17, 2014
New Round of Readmission Penalties Go Live & Hit Hospitals Hard: Home Health Remains Underutilized

Home health offers hospitals one of the best strategies to reduce admissions, but are we living up to the challenge? See what the data show.

Home Health , Hospitals/ACOs ,
By Barbara Rosenblum September 18, 2014
Are Home Health Agencies Adjusting Visits to Make Ends Meet?

Based on SHP's national database, visits per episode have been decreasing by close to a full visit over recent years, but there is something else in play.

Home Health
September 11, 2014
New SHP Visit Utilization by DX and HHRG Report Helps Agencies Control Costs

True performance improvement happens when you marry data with high accountability and embed it in your daily process. The right tools make it possible.

Home Health , Product Update ,
August 25, 2014
SHP OASIS-C to OASIS-C1 Crosswalk Guide Now Available with ICD-9 & ICD-10 Support

This guide is an excellent reference for anyone who works with OASIS Assessments to improve accuracy.

Home Health
July 24, 2014
SHP Vice President of Business Intelligence Chris Attya panelist at NAHC Financial Management Conference

Attaya will be a panelist on the FMC Financial Managers Open Forum / Closing General Session.

Home Health
June 20, 2014
SHP Releases New Telehealth Reporting Functionality

SHP clients now have even better insights into how well telehealth technologies are reducing visits without compromising quality, lowering hospital readmissions rates, controlling costs, improving clinical outcomes, and leading to a better patient experience.

Home Health , Product Update ,
By Barbara Rosenblum June 04, 2014
State of the Industry Report - Three Things Interest SHP

In the State of the Industry Report for Home Health and Hospice, three things in particular struck a chord with me as a technology executive

Home Health
May 30, 2014
SHP Client NHC Makes Forbes List of America's Most Trustworthy Companies

Long-time SHP client National HealthCare Corporation (NHC), has been named by Forbes magazine as one of the 100 Most Trustworthy Companies in America.

Home Health , Company News ,
By Barbara Rosenblum May 22, 2014
OASIS-C1/ICD-9: Vendors Take One For the Team but Agencies Benefit

Efforts on the vendors’ part will greatly ease the transition(s) for home health agencies.

Home Health
By Barbara Rosenblum April 14, 2014
Are Recerts Biting Into Your Bottom Line?

Despite double warnings, late recerts continue to be an issue. Why do they matter and what can you do about it?

Home Health
March 19, 2014
Top Performers Leaderboard - Webinar Available Online

Costs may continue to increase, even as reimbursement rates decline. Efficiency and productivity are being cut because of downsizing.

Home Health
By Barbara Rosenblum March 10, 2014
Are Physicians Contributing to Your Hospital Re-admissions?

In late February, CMS announced that, for the first time, quality measures have been added to Physician Compare for group practices and ACOs.

Home Health
By Barbara Rosenblum February 12, 2014
Man Cannot Live by OASIS Scrubbing Alone

In the period November 1st, 2013, through January 30th, 2014, we averaged a new client every other business day.

Home Health
By Barbara Rosenblum January 21, 2014
CMS More Closely Aligns Hospital and Home Health Incentives with New Readmission Calculation

We think the new measure is more favorable to home health and strikes a nice balance between emulating the hospital measure and giving agencies an accurate evaluation of their performance.

Home Health
By Barbara Rosenblum January 21, 2014
Spend Your Money Wisely When Preparing for ICD-10 and OASIS-C1

If you insist on outsourcing your coding, we’re very accustomed to working with those organizations in a complimentary manner.

Home Health
January 14, 2014
SHP and HCHB Improve Patient Care and Protect Reimbursement

Clients of HCHB now have access to a new style of SHP interface where both transmission of data and retrieval of all SHP alerts takes place directly within the HCHB application.

Home Health , Company News ,
By Barbara Rosenblum July 25, 2013
Comparing Medicare Traditional to Medicare Advantage: Outcomes, Visits, Case Weight and HHCAHPS

Take a look at the data, particularly the difference in length of stay, but with little impact on quality metrics.

Home Health
By Barbara Rosenblum July 22, 2013
CMS Makes Positive Change to Fall Risk Assessment. How Did Your Agency Respond?

I'm interested in learning how your agency has responded to the change.

Home Health
By Barbara Rosenblum July 12, 2013
Important Changes to Home Health Compare Take Effect July 18, 2013

We're pleased to announce that the SHP Real-time Home Health Compare report will be right in synch with the CMS changes.

Home Health
April 18, 2013
SHP Benchmark: 2012 Average Visits per Episode by State

SHP clients have access to a breakdown of average visits by discipline on the Financial Executive Advantage report.

Home Health
By Barbara Rosenblum April 08, 2013
When It Comes to Benchmarking ... Size Matters

Whether looking at financial, clinical or patient satisfaction benchmarks, an organization needs to compare itself to a robust peer group.

Home Health
By Lynda Laff January 23, 2013
Low Case Weight, High Admin Costs, Lengthy Days to RAP: What’s the Real Culprit?

The total OASIS quality review should not take more than 20 to 30 minutes if using a scrubber.

Home Health
December 18, 2012
CONGRATULATIONS to the #1 Performing Agency in the SHP Database

It’s difficult enough to get into SHP’s top 20 percent rank, so imagine what it takes to be No. 1.

Home Health
December 18, 2012
HHCAHPS and FEHC Comparison

We thought it was interesting and just wanted to share that with you.

Home Health
December 18, 2012
SHP Alerts™ Integrated into Point of Care

To drive compliance even more, SHP is working with select home health vendors to integrate these edits directly into their software.

Home Health , Product Update ,
By Barbara Rosenblum October 09, 2012
Fall Risk Assessment Tool: Missouri Alliance Comes to the Rescue

Agencies may use the MAHC-10, including incorporating it into internal documents and computer systems, at no cost.

Home Health
By Barbara Rosenblum September 14, 2012
An Important Message about OASIS Review

As reimbursement shrinks and costs inch up, it’s so important to let go of old behaviors and let efficiency reign.

Home Health
By Barbara Rosenblum June 11, 2012
Which type of home health agency has lower hospital re-admit rates? Hospital based or non-hospital based?

Hospital-based agencies have had lower re-admit rates in general, and tend to lead the industry by a month or more in declining readmit rates.

Home Health
February 17, 2012
New Hospitalization Report Saves Time and Drives Improvement

Too few people have too little data on what actually drives patients into the hospital.

Home Health , Product Update ,
September 01, 2011
The Dollar Figure Behind SHP Alerts

The report contains a line item list showing where all the Case Mix points are being generated – essential for staff education and financial management.

Home Health , Product Update ,
By Barbara Rosenblum July 07, 2011
SHP Data Points to Problems with CMS Fall Risk Assessment

This dilemma paints agencies into a corner, and they answer 'no' to M1910 on OASIS, thus resulting in poor public scores.

Home Health
By Barbara Rosenblum April 25, 2011
Using Home Health and Hospice Dashboards to Manage by Exception

With additional public reporting on the way for both home health and hospice, as well as performance-driven payment and stiffer competition, providers have to work differently than they have in the past.

Home Health , Hospice ,
February 28, 2011
Case Weight Variations by State

How about the variance between case weights at RAP and Final Claim?

Home Health
February 21, 2011
HHCAHPS Administration Tools from SHP

Two HHCAHPS administration tools are now at your disposal to make this possible.

Home Health , Product Update ,
February 18, 2011
SHP Releases New Interface to Cardiocom

Managers and executives can determine the impact of telemonitoring on hospitalization rates, Home Health Compare outcomes and a host of other metrics.

Home Health , Company News ,
By Barbara Rosenblum January 28, 2011
SHP's New ‘Killer App’ for Staff Accountability

With the new interactive staff Overview and Scorecard reports no piece of information remains a mystery.

Home Health , Company News ,
January 18, 2011
SHP and Homecare Homebase Enhance Data Interface

Shared clients can intelligently manage financial data, staff performance, clinical outcomes, patient satisfaction (HHCAHPS), CMS Home Health Compare scores and home care benchmarks – all from one dashboard.

Home Health , Company News ,
By Barbara Rosenblum January 11, 2011
HHCAHPS Year-in-Review: 5 Ways to Utilize Data to Improve Your Scores

Remember, interpersonal communication is determined to be the single most important contributor to patient satisfaction.

Home Health
By Lynda Laff November 30, 2010
How – and Why – Did You Get Those Home Health Compare Scores?

If you have an outside data management company such as Strategic Healthcare Programs (SHP) and you have been analyzing your process measure data, good for you.

Home Health
August 14, 2010
Relationships Matter: Customers Make SHP the Leading HHCAHPS Vendor

54.8% of home care agencies chose their HHCAHPS vendor because of their relationship, SHP is the largest HHCAHPS vendor. Thank you for your vote of confidence.

Home Health