There are many factors to consider when choosing a home healthcare provider. Home health services include Skilled Nursing, Physical, Occupational, Speech, Therapy, Medical Social Services, and Home Health Aide. Choosing a high-quality home healthcare provider that is recognized for excellent care can help increase your likelihood of recovering faster and staying healthy at home. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) reports on home health quality measures on the Care Compare website. The website is a tool to help consumers choose a home healthcare provider. It’s designed to be an easy-to-access, convenient, official source of information about provider quality that is updated quarterly. To make the information easier to use, Care Compare provides tools like “star ratings” that summarize some of the current healthcare provider performance measures to help them make healthcare decisions. Consumers will still find value in the other quality information on Care Compare. There are two types of home health star ratings:
Quality of Patient Star Rating that is measured by:
- Timely Initiation of Care
- Improvement in Ambulation
- Improvement in Bed Transferring
- Improvement in Bathing
- Improvement in Shortness of Breath
- Improvement in Management of Oral Medications
- Acute Care Hospitalization
Patient Survey Star Rating that is measured by:
- Care of Patients
- Communication Between Providers and Patients
- Specific Care Issues
- Overall Rating of Care Provided by the Home Health Agency
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