CHAP Designing ‘Age-Friendly’ Certification for Hospice, Home Health Providers

Community Health Accreditation Partner (CHAP) is developing a certification program designed to apply the Age-Friendly Health Systems “4Ms” framework into the home health and hospice settings.

Providers that have adopted this approach have seen “dramatic improvement” in patient satisfaction, clinician satisfaction and retention, improved revenue growth and cost savings, as well as higher rates of hospice and palliative care utilization, according to Dan McPhilemy, the SVP of marketing and business development at CHAP.

“They’re trying to get the 4Ms to be intentional considerations for every patient that is cared for in the health system,” Dan McPhilemy, the SVP of marketing and business development at CHAP, told Hospice News’ sister site Home Health Care News. “And we wanted to bring that to the home. We’ve started writing standards to create a way for people to get recognized for their participation, and also to demonstrate their ability to participate.”

Age-Friendly Health Systems is an initiative designed to orient care around the specific needs of seniors, based on what the program calls the “4Ms.” These include “what matters, medication, mentation, and mobility.” The first “M” — what matters — refers to a patient’s priorities and goals for their health care and quality of life.

The framework was developed by The John A. Hartford Foundation and the Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI), ​in partnership with the American Hospital Association (AHA) and the Catholic Health Association of the United States (CHA). As many as 2,800 health systems are actively participating, according to the AHA.

The John A. Hartford Foundation awarded CHAP part of a $2.3 million grant to adapt the framework for hospice and home health. 

CHAP is an accreditation body that concentrates on home- and community-based health care services. The organization is among the accreditors to which the U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has given deeming authority.

CHAP has convened an advisory group to assist in designing the certification program, including subject matter experts from Enhabit Inc. (NYSE: EHAB), Humana Inc. (NYSE: HUM), Aveanna Healthcare Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ: AVAH), LHC Group Inc. (NASDAQ: LHCG), Intrepid USA, Bayada, AccentCare, Compassus, Right at Home, Home Care Association of America (HCAOA), the National Association for Home Care & Hospice (NAHC), the National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization (NHPCO) and Axxess.

The program may be particularly beneficial to providers participating in value-based reimbursement programs, according to CHAP Senior Vice President Teresa Harbour.

“So imagine I’m in the value-based purchasing world now and am an agency trying to provide that value,” Harbour said. “If I am focusing on what matters to that patient, that is going to add a lot of value – increased customer satisfaction, increased five star ratings. When I’m incorporating what matters into the plan of care, that’s where I’m going to have improved outcomes. That’s where this goes hand in hand with value-based purchasing.”