Home Care Nurses Drive More Miles For Their Job Each Week Than The Average UPS Driver, USA

Main Category: Nursing / Midwifery
Also Included In: Caregivers / Homecare
Article Date: 29 Jun 2008 - 0:00 PDT

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A study released today by the Washington D.C.-based National Association for Home Care and Hospice shows that the nurses, therapists, home care aides and others who serve elderly and disabled patients in their homes drive, on average, more miles annually than many driving professionals including UPS drivers.

"Caring for over seven million patients annually with 428 million visits, these dedicated providers of home care and hospice are feeling the same pain at the pump as other consumers, but they carry the added burden of the Administration's deep cuts into Medicare and Medicaid benefits, says Val J. Halamadaris, President of the National Association for Home Care and Hospice (NAHC*). "These draconian cuts ignored the cost of living increases, chief among these is the rising price of gasoline -- a commodity most essential for these traveling 'road warriors' of mercy. Home care patients are homebound - they are so sick, so chronically ill, they cannot leave their homes without assistance. If nurses do not get in their cars to visit them, there is no way to reach them. What will be precipitated is a full-scale national emergency," added Halamadaris.

The study shows that the number of miles driven by healthcare providers in the home care industry reached 4.8 billion miles in 2006. (Compared with 2 billion for UPS annually) With the expansion in the use of lower-cost home care services as the average age of the U.S. population rises, the need for these services will continue grow exponentially.

While health care costs, in general, continue to rise, increasing gasoline costs have led to accelerating transportation costs for those caregivers traveling to their homebound patients. The study reviewed the number of miles driven by home health agencies, hospices, and other providers of in-home health care services. Most of this care is funded through Medicare and Medicaid programs, where fixed payment rates have not been adjusted to accommodate the increase in the cost of gasoline.

The study also found that in all areas of the country, those home care providers have curtailed service areas to reduce driving, closed off care access in remote parts of a state, lost care giving staff that cannot afford commuting costs, and reduced face-to-face visits to patients to conserve limited resources. At the same time, these providers report that their patients cannot travel to physician offices or diagnostic testing sites for needed care beyond that provided in their homes. These changes in patient services make home care providers even more essential when they are the primary caregivers.

Increases in other expenses, such as insurance, salaries and supplies, have also been on the rise. Further, in January 2008, the Administration imposed a regulatory cut of 2.75 percent on Medicare home health payments -- nearly negating the market-based inflation update for this year. Additionally, similar cuts to home health payments in 2009, 2010, and 2011 are planned. The findings underscore the need for a series of actions to address the growing crisis in home care.

Halamandaris recommends that Congress take action now through the following steps:

1. Recognize home telehealth interactions as bona fide Medicare home health services; if home care nurses can do more monitoring of patients over the Internet, it will cut back in the number of miles they need to travel each week to visit patients and save those visits for critical care situations rather than routine monitoring

2. Require the Secretary of Health and Human Services to revise the method for calculating annual market-based inflation updates and establish a temporary fuel cost add-on to 5

3. Commit to preserve the annual inflation updates for home health and hospice as provided under the Medicare law

4. Reinstate the 5 percent rural add-on for home health services delivered to patients residing in rural areas

The National Association for Homecare and Hospice is the world's largest trade association advocating for homecare and hospice care. The association, founded in 1982 and headquartered in Washington, DC, encourages development and delivery of the highest quality medical, social and supportive services to the nation's frail, disabled and aged. Home health and hospice services range from high-tech skilled nursing and therapy to personal care management available by visit or around the clock.

http://www.nahc.org