Choosing a home health provider is an important decision—especially when your recovery, safety and comfort depend on it. Knowing how to recognize a high-quality agency can help you avoid getting readmitted to the hospital and get better care at home.
Quality is one of the most important factors to consider when choosing a home health provider. How is quality measured and what should you look for? What are a home health agency’s quality ratings? Do they make it a priority to keep you out of the hospital as much as possible, and can they support their claims with data?
What Quality Care Can Help You Do
Without a way to compare quality, it’s easy to choose a home health provider with lower quality scores, despite having a provider with higher quality scores in the same area. Learning about home health quality measures can help you make an informed choice, so you get care that improves your life.
Choosing a high-quality home health provider that is recognized for exceptional care can help you:
- Manage your condition with confidence
- Recover faster and avoid hospital visits
- Improve comfort, safety and independence at home
Understanding Home Health Quality Measures
There are several clear indicators of quality that can help you choose the best home health care provider for your needs. These measures gauge how well the agency cares for its patients, how often it uses best practices, whether patients improve in important areas and what other patients said about their experience.
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) has developed six domains (goals) that describe the quality it expects from home health care providers. 1 It uses a tool called Outcome and Assessment Information Set (OASIS) to collect information on quality from all Medicare-certified home health agencies. The six quality goals are:
- Make care safer while reducing harm while care is delivered
- Help patients and their families be involved as partners in their care
- Promote effective communication and coordination of care
- Promote effective prevention and treatment of chronic disease
- Work with communities to help people live healthily
- Make care affordable
The CMS Home Health Quality Measures report on how well home health agencies perform as they work to meet these goals. These measures examine things like patient outcomes, whether consistent, quality care is delivered and what patients have to say about the care they receive. 2
Home Health Star Ratings
To make it easier to gauge a home health agency’s quality without spending a lot of time researching, Medicare created “star ratings.” CMS reports on their home health quality measures on the Care Compare website. There is a lot of information about different quality measures available. This summary of the agency’s quality scores can help you quickly make well-informed healthcare decisions.
Home health Star Ratings are on a scale of 1 to 5, with 5 indicating the highest quality. Star Ratings are particularly helpful because they’re based on specific, measurable data, not personal opinions.
There are two types of home health Star Ratings:
Quality of Patient Care Star Ratings
Quality of Patient Care Star Ratings gauge how well agencies help patients regain or maintain key functional abilities and if they follow evidence-based practices. They’re updated quarterly based on data collected by CMS about home health providers nationwide.
Most home health agencies have an average score, which is 3-3½ stars. If an agency’s Quality of Patient Care Star Rating is below 3-3½, it performed below average compared to other home health providers. If an agency scores above 3-3½ stars, it performed above average.
The Quality of Patient Care Star Rating is based on these seven quality measures:
- Timely initiation of patient care
- Better ability to take medications correctly by mouth
- Better ability to move/walk
- Improvement in getting in and out of bed
- Better ability to bathe yourself
- Less shortness of breath
- Less need for acute care hospitalization (fewer trips to the hospital following a home health stay)
Patient Experience of Care Star Rating
These home health star ratings reflect patients’ personal experience, using data from patients and families who have received care from the agency. Patients describe their home health team’s professionalism, communication and care, as well as whether they’d recommend the agency to others. These ratings are updated quarterly by CMS, based on the Home Health Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (HHCAHPS) survey.
The Patient Care Star Rating is based on four quality measures:
- Care of patients (for example, being treated gently, with courtesy and respect)
- Communication between providers and patients (listening, explaining treatment, informing patients of when they’re coming)
- Specific care issues (talking about medications, home safety and pain)
- Overall rating of care
As with Quality of Patient Care Star Ratings, home health providers rate above average in patient satisfaction if they have more than 3-3½ stars.
Other Important Home Health Quality Indicators
Alongside CMS Star Ratings, there are some other important home health quality indicators you can look for in an agency:
Acute Care Hospitalization Rates
Top home health agencies take preventative measures that keep hospital admission rates at or below the national average. Fewer unnecessary hospital visits means you can stay where you are most comfortable – home. With acute care hospitalization (ACH) rates, look for a number at or below the state and national averages. These numbers are part of CMS quality data, and your home health agency should be able to describe how it performs on this measure.
Awards and Recognitions
Top home health agencies often earn objective, third-party recognitions. One good example of this is the annual SHPBest Award:
SHPBest Award
This is an annual listing of home health agencies that consistently show a commitment to high-quality service and patient satisfaction, based on data from the HHCAHPS survey. 3 The SHPBest award has three categories:
- Best-of-the-Best Award – the home health agency with the best overall score
- Premier Performer – top 5% of home health providers nationwide
- Superior Performer – top 20% of home health providers nationwide
How to Check a Home Health Agency’s Quality Scores
Now that you know which home health quality measures to look for, let’s go over where you can find them.
Check Care Compare. CMS’ Care Compare website allows you to check quality scores and do a side-by-side comparison of the home health agencies you’re considering.
Ask Your Doctor. Healthcare providers can help you navigate your home health options. If your doctor recommends a specific home health agency, know that you’re free to choose the provider you feel will best meet your needs. When making this decision, be sure to research home health star ratings and other quality scores.
Call Home Health Agencies. Any provider you’re considering should be able to describe their quality scores and how they stack up against competitors. Talking to a home health professional will also give you insight into the agency’s other specialties and strengths that may not be captured in home health star ratings.
With home health, quality matters. You may be more likely to get the care you need – and the outcome you want – with a high-quality home health provider. If a need for home health arises, take a couple minutes to research quality, so you can find the very best care for your needs.
Amedisys and High-Quality Home Health Care
At Amedisys, we pride ourselves on high-quality home health care. Our home health agencies are nationally accredited, Medicare-certified and more than 90% boast Star Ratings of 4 stars or above.
In addition, many rank as Premier and Superior performers on the SHPBest awards. Our family of more than 18,000 dedicated professionals delivers exceptional, clinically distinctive care to tens of thousands of patients nationwide every day, and Amedisys remains committed to excellence in every aspect of that care.
To learn more about a care center near you, find your location or contact us today.
TeRonna Hall, BSN, RN, CCP, serves as a Clinical Content Development Specialist at Amedisys. With 36 years of healthcare experience, including 34 years in home health, she is dedicated to educating others on health-related topics.
