Traditions Health has promoted Todd Scott to the role of vice president of finance and controller.

“Todd has been an indispensable member of our team, consistently demonstrating his leadership and culture of service,” Traditions Health CFO John Kerndl said in a press statement. “Todd’s contributions have been vital as we continue to establish ourselves as the post-acute care provider of choice.”

The Nashville-based Traditions offers home health, hospice and palliative care services to more than 25,000 patients per year across more than 130 locations in 18 states.

Scott first joined Traditions in 2022. He previously served as the director of accounting and finance. Before that, he was the senior director of accounting and group controller at Envision Healthcare.

Optum vet joins WelbeHealth

WelbeHealth has named Becca Miller Rose as its chief operating officer.

WelbeHealth is a Program of All-Inclusive Care for the Elderly (PACE) operator that launched in 2015. The organization delivers services to its PACE members across California, including in the cities of Stockton, Modesto, Pasadena, Long Beach, Fresno and more.

Prior to her appointment, Rose served as COO of the Optum Home-Based Medical Care business. She joined Optum as part of its acquisition of Landmark Health.

In her new role, Rose will team up with the company’s CMO Dr. Michael Le, who she previously worked with at Landmark Health, to head up WelbeHealth’s PACE operations.

“Through my professional roles as well as personal experience serving hospice patients, I understand the needs of seniors and their family caregivers for higher quality community-based care,” Rose said in a press statement. “I am excited to address these needs for our most vulnerable populations through expanding access to PACE as WelbeHealth’s operational leader.”

BrightSpring makes addition to board of directors

Olivia Kirtley has joined BrightSpring Health Services’ (Nasdaq: BTSG) board of directors.

BrightSpring is a Louisville, Kentucky-based provider of home- and community-based services. The company serves complex populations that require specialized or chronic care.

Kirtley has served on the boards of companies such as U.S. Bancorp, Vista Credit Strategic Lending Corp., Papa John’s International, Rangold Resources Ltd and ResCare Inc.

“We are thrilled Olivia has joined our board of directors,” BrightSpring President and CEO Jon Rousseau said in a statement. “She will leverage her wealth of experience and expertise in audit, financial reporting, risk management, controls, systems, regulatory matters, and people insights and expertise to further strengthen BrightSpring’s mission to make a difference in the lives of the people and communities we serve.”

Papa creates a trust and safety advisory board

At-home companionship company Papa has created a trust and safety advisory board in an effort to further keep members and Papa Pals safe during home visits.

“While over 99.9% of Papa visits go without a member-reported safety concern, even one report is too many,” Jane Yu, Papa’s head of trust and safety, said in a statement. “This is why we have doubled down on trust and safety, partnering with leading experts to help guide continual improvements — because we know this work is never done.”

Papa delivers companionship services to older adults in their homes.

The members of Papa’s new board includes Ally Coll, an attorney and founder of The Purple Method, and Jeremy Gottschalk, the CEO of Marketplace Risk. Michelle Feng, CEO of Executive Mental Health, has also joined the trust and safety advisory board.

“As the caregiver shortage continues to worsen, and older adults have fewer people — if any — to rely on, Papa is creating a care experience that brings human help right to the front door in a way that is essential for older adults to age well and at home,” Yu said. “We’re proud to employ industry-leading safety measures and ongoing improvements that reflect our commitment to keep the safety of our members and Papa Pals front and center. We have enhanced our background checks and safety guardrails to be the industry gold standard, and are ready to build on these in the year ahead.”

Health Dimensions Group adds two new leaders

Health Dimensions Group has added Todd Ellingson and Becky Kaufmann to its leadership team. Ellingson will serve as CFO, and Kaufmann as vice president of clinical services.

Health Dimensions Group operates a portfolio of 25 senior living communities across eight states. It also has a major contingent of skilled nursing properties. The company’s consulting experts work with senior living communities, health systems and PACE organizations.

Prior to joining the company, Ellingson served as CFO at Logic Information Systems.

“Todd Ellingson is a highly regarded financial leader who excels at developing innovative financial and business processes to enhance growth, corporate value and drive organizational success,” Amber Rogotzke, president and principal at Health Dimensions Group, said in a press release. “His invaluable health care and consulting experience and presence on our executive leadership team guides Health Dimensions Group forward in meeting our strategic priorities as well as the financial goals of our clients.”

Before joining Health Dimensions Group, Kaufmann served as senior vice president quality of life and memory support at Chapters Living.

“Having started her career as a registered nurse, Becky has a deep understanding of the factors that contribute to seniors’ overall health, wellness, and satisfaction,” Heather Haberhern, senior vice president of quality at Health Dimensions Group, said in a statement. “As vice president of clinical services, Becky Kaufmann is already positioning Health Dimensions Group’s communities and consulting clients to achieve quality outcomes and long-term operational, clinical, and financial success.”

Vitas Healthcare promotes four leaders

Vitas Healthcare has added Kathleen Coronado, Anthony Cosma, Mario De La Rosa and Angela Hamrick to its executive management team.

Coronado was named associate vice president of hospice operations, Cosma will serve as vice president of hospice operations, De La Rosa was appointed vice president of the home medical equipment division and Hamrick was also named vice president of hospice operations.

Vitas Healthcare is an end-of-life care provider operating across 14 states and Washington, D.C.

The post Traditions Health Promotes New VP of Finance; Optum Vet Joins WelbeHealth As COO appeared first on Home Health Care News.

In the broader at-home care space, Dr. Michael Le is considered an innovator.

As the co-founder and former chief medical officer of Landmark Health, he was integral in helping build a company that would eventually catch the eye of UnitedHealth Group’s (NYSE: UNH) Optum.

His impressive resume — which also includes time at Optum Home & Community Care and CareMore Health Plan — places him at the forefront of the movement bringing more care to the home and the community. It all started with, in Le’s words, the image of “the revered small-town doc with his black doctor’s bag doing house calls.”

Now, Le is on to his next chapter. Last month, he joined WelbeHealth as its chief medical officer.

WelbeHealth is a Program of All-Inclusive Care for the Elderly (PACE) operator that launched in 2015. The organization delivers services to its PACE members across California, including in the cities of Stockton, Modesto, Pasadena, Long Beach, Fresno and more.

Le is excited about the PACE model’s ability to improve health outcomes and lower costs through preventative care.

Home Health Care News recently caught up with Le for the latest episode of TALKS.

During the conversation, Le also touched on other care delivery models he finds interesting, and the importance of collaborations between PACE organizations and home-based care providers.

HHCN: I’m really excited that you could make it for TALKS because you’ve had such a distinguished career in health care, particularly around the home- and community-based setting. You were the CMO of Optum Home & Community Care, and before that, you helped build Landmark Health. Can you talk a little bit about these experiences?

Le: I’m very excited to share a bit of my experiences and also the WelbeHealth story. I was the co-founder and chief medical officer at Landmark, which we started about 10 years ago with the premise that the sickest and frailest population, they really struggled to get into the medical office, and they really needed around-the-clock care. Our solution at that time was to create a completely mobile physician-led interdisciplinary medical group that brought intensive house calls to patients 24/7, in the comfort of their homes.

Now, it’s very robust, and obviously, an expensive model with fully employed docs, nurse practitioners, psychiatrists, social workers, nurses, pharmacists, dieticians and navigators. We could only cover that cost through value-based contracting and taking total cost of care risk on the population, so that we could really staff and man the teams from day one to take care of the sickest patients. Fortunately, we had tremendous results and grew from just the four founders, and an idea, to being responsible for about 250,000 patients and about $2.5 billion in revenue across 20 states by 2021. By that time, we became the largest risk-bearing in-home medical care provider in the country.

Of course, that brings us up to the pandemic. Now, these very sick patients, they couldn’t even get into the offices. Our Landmark providers were able to go into the homes with full PPE to get them the care they needed, to help keep them out of ERs, which could potentially have been very deadly and catastrophic to them. That ability to care for patients in the homes at all times, and in all conditions, really got the attention of UnitedHealthcare and Optum, which then acquired Landmark in 2021 and used it as a platform for everything at home — naviHealth, Prospero, Optum at home, the institutional special needs, their in-home assessments program — all came under this platform. Happy to say it continued to grow to this year where now it’s about 16,000 employees covering almost a million patient lives across 39 states. I was the founding CMO for Optum, their home and community care. It’s great to see this growth and interest in bringing care to the home. I love the expansion nationally, but then I really felt much more at home in a smaller, nimble company where I could feel I could make even more difference.

I left Optum in March of this year for many different reasons, but especially the culture and the patient population we serve ended up here at WelbeHealth. Very happy to be here and just serving the most frail and complex patients and trying to give them the services that many times through their lives they probably have not received, but are in desperate need of.

You also led value-based care at CareMore Health Plan and Healthcare Partners, correct?

Le: Yes. I started my career at Healthcare Partners as a hospitalist, which was a capitated medical group here in Southern California. I worked in the ER and hospitals and witnessed the end result of this fragmentation and uncoordinated care that was failing our patients, and so it started to give me a picture of the gaps in the access to care and what needed to be done to help fill that.

I was there for 10 years and then was recruited to CareMore where I ran their high-risk programs, high-risk clinics, social SWAT team, case management, palliative care, hospice care, but also my pet program, the HouseCalls program, which was a bit of a model for the founding of Landmark. Both were premier organizations in the value-based care arena and really helped to mold a lot of my thinking on how to deliver innovative, high-quality, but really cost-effective care.

Thank you for walking us through your background a little bit there. We’ll get to WelbeHealth in just a second, but I am curious, did you always have this clear interest in home- and community-based care models, or did you gradually get into these areas?

Le: I actually have an interesting backstory to your question. I actually grew up in small town in Western Massachusetts and watched my dad, who is a primary care doc, do house calls when patients just couldn’t make it into his office. Really that vision of the revered small-town doc with his black doctor’s bag doing house calls was what attracted me to medicine in the first place. By the time I finished medical school and residency, I thought those Marcus Welby days of the house calls were long gone.

Again, I initially started work as a hospitalist, but as I kept seeing patients revolve back and forth in and out of the hospital, it just didn’t make sense. I thought, what the heck? Why don’t I just go see them in their homes? Obviously, it’s very eye-opening seeing patients in the home versus a 15-minute office appointment. You see the hoarding, the fall risk, the lack of social support, the empty fridges, and the true root causes of why they couldn’t stay out of the hospital. Then it makes sense you address those, and they become better.

Ever since then, it’s been my passion that instead of making a very sick and frail patient come to the system, let’s bring the system, the teams, the procedures to patients where they’re at in the comfort of their home and do it 24/7. Actually, just as a bit of a rewarding aside to me, Landmark ultimately expanded to Massachusetts, and we had three patients in that same small town that I grew up in. Very much coming back full circle for me to be able to provide that same care in the same communities I watched my dad serve just decades ago. That’s how I got into home and community care. That’s what keeps me here. That vision of bringing back that care from that golden era in some ways of medicine.

That has to be really cool getting to take it home. We’ve obviously seen home- and community-based care take on a bigger role in the broader health care continuum since 2020. What’s your take on that? I’m guessing that’s something you find exciting and long overdue.

Le: Absolutely, and so glad you asked about that. We’ve already seen a trend of so many services outside of health care being brought to the convenience of the home. The pandemic just accelerated that movement within health care. I think policymakers, the health care industries, cities, and communities across the country are realizing that we’re truly facing this rapidly growing elderly population — silver tsunami as they say. They don’t want to be treated in a nursing home. They want to reside in the comfort of their homes as independently as possible.

Remember, PACE has been around for a long time. It started in the 70s. I think there’s finally this appetite to invest in and dramatically scale community-based care at home for seniors. It’s certainly exciting to see, and I think it’s very much long overdue. I think we still have states without PACE programs, and that’s got to change. Thankfully, with robust support from the federal level and then drawing momentum of research and state and community commitments to PACE, we’re having this conversation at a really pivotal time.

I know that the vast majority of older adults want to age in place. Not only that, but we know that the care in the home is less costly than traditional nursing home care, and so the pandemic just accelerated all this. We’re happy to say that during the pandemic, the PACE programs and Welbe in particular had dramatic impacts in terms of saving lives, reducing mortality rates. We’re happy to be a leader and helping to drive some of those better outcomes for the sickest and frailest population.

Why WelbeHealth, and why did you want to work in the PACE space?

Le: In reality, I did have a lot of options and I wanted to be very selective in terms of what I wanted to do. As I mentioned before, I was searching for a smaller, more nimble growth organization that was really lined up with my passion for serving the most vulnerable and underserved populations.

I knew from my previous experiences just how crucially important culture and mission is to the success of organizations. I was aware of PACE long before, and quite frankly, I was a bit envious of all the additional services and resources that we just couldn’t provide through our traditional Medicare Advantage risk contracts like adult day services, dental, vision, meals, transportation, home health, physical therapy, all these things that I would’ve loved to provide for my patients previously, there are great resources in the PACE space.

Also, I knew some prior coworkers who had come to Welbe and talked to them and just became more intrigued the more that I learned. Really what sealed the deal was coming into these beautiful care centers and seeing such needing and deserving patients all being cared for by such passionate and mission-driven employees. The culture and the commitment was just so strong.

As I did more research, Welbe has shown some of the most impressive success during the pandemic in terms of their outcomes and really life-saving results for the PACE model. Welbe just had such a great reputation in the industry. Then, once I met the team and experienced the culture, it was not a difficult decision at all to bring my experiences here and join, and it just felt like home. It felt natural and comfortable.

You stepped into the CMO role in May. What are your short-term goals for WelbeHealth and what are some of your long-term goals for the organization?

Le: Let me start with the long-term vision first, and then I’ll get down to what I’m trying to look at in the short-term. Our ultimate long-term vision, it stretches even beyond PACE. It’s how do we redefine the health care service paradigm for seniors, just plain and simple. Right now, just nursing homes are serving a much larger percentage of the population than it actually needs to, and it’s not financially viable for many adults. As for nursing homes, the outcomes just are not as good in many instances.

PACE is rapidly growing right now, and long-term, we want Welbe to be leading that innovation and helping to drive PACE and deliver PACE to more and more patients in more and more communities. We’ve steadily grown over the past five years here in California, and we’re continuing that growth and looking to serve more cities and communities I think more broadly.

Now, in the short-term, I think I’m looking at the clinical model and really looking to see where we can optimize and standardize because I think there’s a lot of great things and great pockets that are going on, but how do we take all of the best practices at the different centers, drive towards that consistency of what we’ve established as those evidence-based best practices and really hold the programs accountable to the highest standards of clinical excellence and compliance and quality?

We’re really helping get all those sorts of tools to our providers so they can consistently provide the best-in-class care to our participants.

At the start of June, WelbeHealth announced that it was opening two new locations in Southern California. Talk a little bit about this, and does the company have further plans to expand its footprint?

Le: WelbeHealth already operates centers in Pasadena and Long Beach here in Southern California. We’re looking to open two new locations in Rosemead and North Hollywood in Los Angeles County. Both these locations are home to highly diverse populations, including thousands of seniors who would be eligible for PACE that currently don’t have a great wealth of provider options to choose from. We’re currently enrolling new members in Rosemead and North Hollywood and looking to start offering services come July 1st. I’m very involved in helping to launch those markets.

I also wanted to add that these new locations, as I walk in them, they’re so thoughtfully designed with contemporary spaces that really inspire an environment where our participants can just get mentally rejuvenated while receiving the highest quality medical care. They have featured outdoor social spaces, garden walls, hair salons, laundry rooms, really to get a bit of respite from some of the loneliness and the limited access to personal care that many lower-income individuals experience.

To really meet the needs of our participants, WelbeHealth has employed very multilingual staff across many, many positions and have culturally-appropriate meal menus, activities, and other services to really give the best service for our local communities. The reception’s just been tremendous. The communities have been so excited. I think it just really underscores just how underserved and how much pent-up demand there is for these PACE services.

While I think growth and expansion is exciting, clinical quality is really our first and foremost goal. There have been times in the past when WelbeHealth has intentionally held back on growth if we didn’t feel like all the components of the model were fully hired and trained, and to ensure that we’ve provided the best and highest quality care. Yes, absolutely excited to think about the potential growth, but quality and making sure that we deliver the best possible care is always the first cornerstone.

It’s not just WelbeHealth that’s expanding, the PACE concept is beginning to expand into more markets as well. What do you expect this space, this market to look like in five years, for example? Will there be PACE in every city, every state?

Le: There absolutely should be. PACE should be in every state. It’s a model that works. The data really supports this. We just need to invest in it, commit to it, and really embark on a very broad-based public educational campaign, so that more and more seniors and their caregivers know that this is an option for them. The program’s been around since the 70s and currently it serves about 60,000 people nationally today. The growth for many decades has been slow, but I really do sense that we’re at a bit of an inflection point. It’s starting to change in a major way, and there’s this exponential momentum to grow, and especially in states like California.

In California alone, the number of PACE centers has more than doubled in the past five years and enrollment has tripled. The pandemic, like I said, has certainly accelerated a lot of this growth, but we want to maintain it. We want to be able to nurture it and continue to build on it. WelbeHealth is certainly considering opportunities to serve more seniors in California and beyond because I think there’s so much need and the need out there is so immense. We remain very active in California, as does the National PACE Association, to try to continue to be leaders in advocating for the expansion of PACE.

I would hope that five years from now, PACE or PACE-like models would be almost considered the standard of care for a very sick and frail individuals with significant functional challenges, as the solution to help them remain as safe and as independent as possible in the comfort of their homes surrounded by their loved ones.

Speaking of keeping seniors safe, one of the things that put PACE on the map as a care model was its ability to keep seniors alive and safe during the height of the pandemic, especially compared to nursing homes. WelbeHealth was a big part of this conversation. The National PACE COVID-19 death rate was 3.8%, compared to 11.8% in nursing homes and WelbeHealth’s COVID-19 death rate was 2.4%. Can you talk about some of the care delivery advantages of the PACE model?

Le: Obviously those are results that we’re super proud of. First, I’d say that PACE improves health outcomes. There’s a 24% lower hospitalization rate amongst PACE members compared to dually eligible beneficiaries who receive their care in nursing homes. People receiving care through PACE programs are also less likely to be readmitted to the hospital or suffer emergency room visits. All of this significantly reduces the likelihood of being admitted to a nursing home and all the complications that arise from being in a health care setting unnecessarily.

Secondly, I think PACE participants receive better preventative care with the capitated model that PACE has, and it really aligns the incentives to provide very preventive care and to be as innovative and efficient as possible with patient care. With respect to hearing, vision, depression, and palliative screenings, we do all that and provide nutrition, flu shots, vaccinations — all these things to really catch things early and prevent all the downstream complications.

Also, because the model is so high-touch and there’s so many different team members seeing the participants, any one of them can identify, ‘Oh, something’s a little bit off,’ and then we can investigate and we can treat conditions early and prevent exacerbations and complications downstream. Also, I think that there’s a lot of caregiver satisfaction. It’s so hard being a caregiver for a loved one who has a lot of dependencies. We found that 96% of family members are satisfied with the support that they received through PACE and 97.5% of caregivers would recommend PACE to someone in a similar situation. We are this 24/7 lifeline for caregivers, and it significantly reduces that burden and burnout that they experience.

Another one is that PACE participants are less likely to suffer depression. Studies have shown that 27% of new PACE enrollees when screened scored as depressed on initial assessments before enrollment. Now, fast forward nine months and 80% of those individuals no longer report being depressed, likely because they’re receiving the care that they may have never had in the community before and we’ve reduced a lot of the stressors that they have.

I’d say lastly, the participant satisfaction is tremendous. Participants rated their satisfaction with PACE as 4.1 out of 5. We know that in health care the satisfaction can be very low. This is tremendous. The disenrollment rate for PACE is 5% less than the Medicare Advantage plans. This is even more impressive when you consider that our population, a large majority, is Medicaid eligible and there’s much more churn in the Medicaid population compared to the MA. I think being able to have that high retention and that very high-touch model and being especially there when you need it for them is so important.

My view is essentially what we’re providing for our patients, it’s concierge-level care, but not for those who can afford it, but it’s actually those patients who really have the least resources and actually really need this model the most.

You’re obviously the CMO and this is more of a business question, but what do the financials around PACE look like? How stable is the reimbursement environment, and are PACE operators struggling to stay afloat like nursing homes or home health agencies, or other senior care organizations?

Le: Happy to delve into a non-clinical question there. First, I’ll just say that PACE overall delivers exceptional outcomes at a lower cost to seniors, and that’s part of the reason it’s exciting to see the model scale. In addition to bringing these tremendous patient care outcomes, costs have been impressively lower. PACE saves around $10,000 per patient, per year, according to a 2022 study from the Bipartisan Policy Center. PACE organizations, overall, save the government and taxpayers an estimated hundred million dollars.

That said, the programs have been, in the past, limited in terms of their growth due to the capital necessary to build out these centers and deliver the comprehensive services. It costs millions and millions of dollars to open a PACE center. I think at WelbeHealth, we’re a bit unique, and I think we’ve been fortunate that as a public benefit company, we’re navigating this challenge with a business approach that ensures that we have the capital necessary to really deliver on the mission.

I’ll also say that having come from a lot of organizations that have been investor-backed, we’re fortunate to have investors that are very much mission-aligned to what we do and they’re playing a long game. They understand that it takes time to really change the trajectory and the cost of care, and it takes time to transform health care delivery in communities. They’re all in on very thoughtful investments in terms of the infrastructure, the teams, the technology to really scale the model and drive lasting long-term results many years down the road and not just what quarterly financials look like.

These investments I think have allowed us to be creative and really develop innovative systems, technologies, and processes that are dedicated and laser-focused on the PACE space and the PACE model, as opposed to if we were part of a bigger system where we’d have to compromise or where we might be just a bit smaller afterthought as part of a larger system, but we are able to make these investments in exactly to what we need in exactly what the PACE space needs.

In your view, how does the PACE model fit into the broader shift towards value-based care?

Le: I feel very strongly about this. The health care providers and organizations should be assessed based upon the quality of the care that they deliver and their health outcomes. The model of getting paid per nursing home bed that you fill, heads in beds, or the volume of services provided is a totally broken fee-for-service system. I think that most people are starting to recognize that. The industry is recognizing that, but change is always a bit slower than common sense and the recognition of it.

I think the pandemic really did shine that spotlight on the need for – and really the benefit of – at-home services for older adults. Also, more importantly, our population is growing older and there’s this growing recognition amongst the government industry leaders that we need to scale solutions that are targeted specifically for their needs. One size does not fit all, and we need to really curate models that are tailored to the specific needs and challenges of the older population.

Research has shown that PACE is one of the very highly effective solutions that we have at our disposal to meet the needs of the 77,000 aging baby boomers that we have in our country. Over the last several years, the Biden administration has taken steps to really pick up where the Obama administration left off, essentially, which is continuing to invest further into PACE. The home-based care models are more efficient and very cost-effective at keeping the elderly patients healthier and happier than institutional care settings. I think the value-based approach is exactly what PACE was built upon.

What are some of the main ways PACE providers should be collaborating with home-based care organizations to help keep seniors healthy? Are there natural collaborations for Medicare-certified home health agencies, or private pay home care providers? What’s your view on this?

Le: I’m excited to be a bit of a liaison between PACE and some of the home-based care experiences I’ve had in the past. PACE certainly does have some elements of home care, but we need to expand it more. Especially when I think about times when we’re launching new markets or when our membership is small in the early days of markets, you could actually burn out providers just with the call burning and things like that of having to be on call or do urgent visits and other things like that.

I see that there’s ways of collaborating with home health or care providers. Especially in that way of, can we partner so that maybe for after-hours, or maybe for weekend coverage, if we need someone seen and we need services delivered, we can partner with those entities to provide that around-the-clock care? Or, procedures that can really help to stabilize some of the patients in place so they don’t have to end up in urgent cares or ERs or hospitals?

When you first joined WelbeHealth, you said: “Revolutionizing how we care for the most vulnerable in our diverse communities is what inspires and motivates me.” What are some of the ways the company is working to innovate PACE care delivery models?

Le: WelbeHealth’s purpose and values really define us. That’s why last June, Welbe amended our certificate of formation and became the first, and the only, public benefits company in PACE, formalizing this commitment to weighing the interest of all stakeholders, including our providers, including participants, including employees alongside with our shareholders. Changing the company status really means holding ourselves to a higher standard of transparency and accountability. That really resonated with me. The health care system has given consumers too many reasons to distrust and be skeptical of it.

We really do believe that PACE programs should set this very high standard for clinical care and compliance excellence. We’ve been intentional about prioritizing both as we continue to expand and really consider some of the future opportunities. We’re very motivated in terms of being able to improve the care of the most vulnerable, really helping to create opportunities and jobs where team members who are passionate can find that outlet to be able to do their mission-driven work.

It’s about really being able to enrich and improve the health care delivery system in the communities that we’re touching, really to help our patients live longer with much higher quality of life and great satisfaction.

Again, looking at your background, you have such a great understanding of home- and community-based care trends. Apart from PACE, is there a care delivery model that you find fascinating, and why?

Le: Yes, as a former hospitalist, I’ll say that I’ve always closely followed hospital at home. I think it provides great services for the patients that actually qualify for the services and whom they touch. It too, similar to PACE, has had challenges in scaling and growing, but I do think that it’s starting to change and gaining momentum in terms of growing and expanding also.

From a problem-solving brain, there’s a lot of logistical and operational challenges and issues that I’m very intrigued by in terms of how you solve some of these challenges to get the care to patients. You can certainly see a lot of the similarities and parallels between hospital at home and PACE. I think we’ve definitely started on that upward trend of growth and momentum. Because I’m a big fan of the model, I’m hoping that hospital at home also has that inflection point.

I’ll also say that, just very excited to see home health becoming much more of a key vertical in integrated delivery systems. Optum had already purchased LHC while I was there and now the news of them making a bid for Amedisys, it just really shows just how much interest there is, and frankly, acknowledgment of the important role that home health is going to be playing in the value-based arena in the future. Certainly exciting for the home health industry, and I’ll be watching very eagerly to see how it all plays out.

Yes, that is certainly some big news, and HHCN will also be watching and covering, so look out for that coverage. Before we wrap up this episode of TALKS, I wanted to ask what else is important to bring up? What else do you want to say or talk about?

Le: We’ve covered so much, and I think in closing, I just want to underscore just how exciting this moment really is for those of us who are really invested in PACE and are in terms of reinventing the nursing home industry. PACE has unprecedented political and industry support right now like never before, and companies like WelbeHealth are charting a genuinely new and effective approach to very high-needs markets for delivering holistic care to seniors facing complex medical, social, behavioral challenges.

Looking ahead, I’m just very excited to see PACE grow nationally and for Welbe to continue to be a driving leader and advocate for that path forward.

The post WelbeHealth’s Michael Le On The Future Of Innovative At-Home Care Models appeared first on Home Health Care News.

Boost Home Healthcare has named Larry Blacker its new brand president.

Boost is a Michigan-based home health provider that offers in-home nursing, therapy and home care services. The company was acquired by The Riverside Company in 2021 and is now part of Best Life Brands.

“Larry comes to us with an extensive background in the home care industry,” Best Life Brands CEO J.J. Sorrenti said in a statement. “His experience will play a key role in continuing to scale the business across the country, allowing us to bring Boost Home Health services to more people.”

Blacker has over two decades of experience in the home care industry, and he will now oversee Boost’s operations and expansion across the country.

Before joining Boost, Blacker most recently served as home care administrator for Seabrook Village in Tinton Falls, New Jersey.

“I look forward to overseeing the growth of Boost and the important work of providing a personalized and safe environment for patients to maintain their independence while receiving the care they need,” Blacker said.

MedArrive hires chief clinical officer

The mobile-integrated care management company MedArrive has named Pater Samuel its new chief clinical officer.

In the new role, Samuel will oversee MedArrive’s home-based clinical programs and help establish clinical protocols and quality standards, among other duties.

MedArrive is an Irving, Texas-based startup that both coordinates and delivers care in the home. 

Before joining MedArrive, Samuel held a number of leadership roles, most recently as the national medical director at DispatchHealth. Samuel also spent more than seven years in clinical leadership roles at US Acute Care Solutions (USACS).

In April, MedArrive raised $8 million more in funding, bringing its funding total to over $40 million since it officially launched in late 2020.

UVMHN Home Health & Hospice names new president, COO

Christine Werneke has been named president and COO of the University of Vermont Health Network Home Health & Hospice.

Werneke previously served the provider Home Health & Hospice for six years in a number of leadership roles before the organization’s affiliation with the UVM Health Network.

Werneke had been filling in on an interim basis for Adrianne Johnson Ross, who stepped down from the role in January.

“Christine’s current and previous service to the patients and people of Home Health & Hospice make her the right person to lead this team forward,” UVM Health Network’s president and CEO Sunny Eappen said in a statement. “Home health and hospice agencies face unique challenges that impact the entire health care system, and I am confident that Christine is bringing the day-to-day compassion, experience and innovation that will be vital to ensure we are providing the highest quality care for our patients and families and the best working environment for our staff.”

Werneke will be leading the organization that has been providing care for more than 100 years.

“Home Health & Hospice is deeply committed to serving our community members,” Werneke said in a statement. “I am committed to promoting a culture of service, safety, respect and trust and honored to continue the legacy of this organization for providing exceptional care for our neighbors. This is an exciting step forward and I am proud to take it with my colleagues by my side.”

WelbeHealth announces two leadership moves

WelbeHealth, the California-based Program of All-Inclusive Care for the Elderly (PACE) organization, has added two industry veterans to its leadership team. Dr. Michael Le will serve as WelbeHealth’s chief medical officer, while Bindu Purushothaman will serve as chief information officer.

Le has had a distinguished career in home-based care. Most recently, he served as chief medical officer of Optum Home and Community Care. Before that, Le co-founded and served as CMO of Landmark Health.

“Revolutionizing how we care for the most vulnerable in our diverse communities is what inspires and motivates me,” Le said in a statement.

Purushothaman comes from Satellite Health, where he also served as chief information officer. Prior to that job, he held roles at HealthCare Partners, Davita Medical Group and Optum.

WelbeHealth is a PACE operator that launched in 2015. It delivers services to its PACE members across California, including the cities of Stockton, Modesto, Pasadena, Long Beach and Fresno.

ProMedica appoints new CFO

ProMedica has named Terry Metzger as its new chief financial officer.

The Toledo, Ohio-based ProMedica is a nonprofit health system that recently sold its home-based care and hospice capabilities. There are 12 hospitals, more than 2,500 physicians, a health plan, assisted living facilities, skilled nursing centers and more under the ProMedica umbrella.

Gentiva – the company comprising the hospice and personal home care assets of what was formerly Kindred at Home – acquired ProMedica’s Heartland home health and hospice assets for $710 million in February.

Before joining ProMedica, Metzger most recently served as the system chief operating officer at Ascension St. Vincent in Indianapolis.

“We are pleased to welcome Terry to our team as chief financial officer,“ ProMedica President and CEO Arturo Polizzi said in a statement. “Given his extensive experience in health care, insurance and technology, we are highly confident he will play a key role in driving our financial strategy forward and positioning our organization for greater stability and success.”

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Despite that traction and the model’s clear benefits, PACE still faces a long list of formidable growth barriers.

An alternative to nursing homes, PACE is a Medicare and Medicaid program that helps keep people in their communities. Oftentimes, programs are run out of community-based centers with the support of in-home care providers and their staff.

“Embedded in this model is that the PACE program also addresses the social determinants of health for the enrollees and wraps around this care with a very comprehensive interdisciplinary care team,” Jade Gong, founder and principal of consulting firm Jade Gong & Associates, told Home Health Care News.

At any particular time, 95% of PACE enrollees are living in the community, with about 5% in nursing homes, according to Robert Greenwood, senior vice president of public affairs at the National PACE Association.

“This is pretty remarkable, given that you have to be eligible for nursing home care before you can even enroll in PACE,” he told HHCN.

Based in Alexandria, Virginia, the National PACE Association is an industry advocacy group that focuses on federal and state policies to support the financial viability of the PACE model.

Broadly, the majority of PACE participants are eligible for both Medicare and Medicaid. PACE operators receive a set monthly payment for each participant. Typically, PACE is both payer and provider.

“Having a capitated payment really helps the PACE model because we’re able to emphasize providing primary and preventive care over the things that are really expensive, which are emergency room visits, hospital visits or permanent placement in a nursing home,” Greenwood said.

While the PACE model has been attracting interest over the past few years, the COVID-19 emergency played a major role in ramping up this attention, according to Gong.

“The model just performs so well under COVID,” she said. “There are many different kinds of providers — nonprofit, for-profit, housing — that are interested in PACE or relationships with PACE programs.”

If one provider exemplifies the performance success the model saw amid the public health emergency, it’s WelbeHealth, a Menlo Park, California-based operator of PACE programs.

Overall, WelbeHealth and the PACE community had lower death rates than their nursing homes counterparts, research has found.

In fact, the national PACE COVID-19 death rate was 3.8%, compared to 11.8% in nursing homes. WelbeHealth’s COVID-19 death rate was 2.4%, according to a recent case study conducted by UC Berkeley.

For context, WelbeHealth serves LA and Central Valley, which have both been COVID-19 hotspots at times.

“These were places where crematoriums listed their pollution caps because they had too many bodies piling up,” Si France, founder and CEO of WelbeHealth, told HHCN. “This is where paramedics were asked to start rationing care. The hospitals were full, and they had to fill up their parking lot pop-up units. That was the nightmare context where we had these dramatically lower death rates.”

Over the years, WelbeHealth has seen growth as the organization aimed to serve underserved markets in California. The company added a Fresno program in late 2020 and will serve about 1,000 participants by the end of the year.

“We ranked California cities by highest unmet need, and started working on serving them, in order, beginning with Stockton and Pasadena in 2019, then Long Beach in 2020,” France said. “None of these communities had any PACE services despite having a high need. You had no access to this program that increases quality of life and length of life.”

France noted that PACE enrollees experience an 80% reduction in depression and generally have a higher life satisfaction. They also tend to live longer under the comprehensive and interdisciplinary care model.

Despite strong outcomes from many PACE providers, such as WelbeHealth, there is still room for expansion.

In total, there are 140 PACE organizations operating 272 PACE centers in 30 states, serving over 56,000 participants, according to the National PACE Association.

One of the major barriers to furthering PACE expansion is how high the cost of entry can be for new operators.

“When an organization wants to look at developing a PACE program, it’s not just building the center, hiring the staff, having the right information systems, and leasing or buying the vans to provide transportation,” Greenwood said. “Part of the startup costs is operating in those initial months when you don’t have a big enough enrollment to bring in the revenue that really covers all your expenses.”

Another roadblock is the PACE application process, which requires the state to develop a rate-setting methodology for anyone who’s a Medicaid eligible PACE enrollee. States must also agree to take on certain oversight responsibilities.

“One of the things that really stops a provider from being able to develop PACE is the willingness of the state they’re operating in to support that development,” Greenwood said.

In an effort to drive PACE expansion, Sen. Bob Casey, a Democrat from Pennsylvania and chairman of the Senate Special Committee on Aging, introduced the “PACE Plus Act” in April.

The legislation has received a warm reception from industry insiders for being comprehensive and attempting to cut through red tape.

“I have some sense of optimism that we’re going to get some real traction on the bill this year,” Gong said. “I have talked to some of the senators in states where I have clients, and there’s tremendous interest in seeing PACE expansion.”

If passed, the PACE Plus Act would make room for the creation of new PACE programs and the expansion of current ones through federal grants. The legislation also encourages non-PACE states to take up the model by providing incentives.

Additionally, the legislation would lessen the bureaucratic burden that growing PACE programs face while also providing technical assistance resources.

Another bright spot has been various states’ willingness to consider the PACE model, according to Greenwood.

“States have been looking more closely at how they want to provide long-term care supports and services in the future,” he said. “They’re looking at what else they can do beyond offering nursing home residential care. I think they’ve become a lot more open to supporting PACE as a way to provide more healthy community-based services.”

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Addus HomeCare Corporation (Nasdaq: ADUS) has promoted Brad Bickham to the role of president and chief operating officer.

Frisco, Texas-based Addus provides personal care, home health and hospice services to about 44,000 consumers, through 212 locations in 22 states.

Bickham’s promotion was internal. He first joined Addus in 2017, previously serving as the company’s executive vice president and COO.

“I am very excited and honored by the opportunity to take on this important additional leadership role with Addus,” Bickham said in a statement. “It has been exciting to see the tremendous growth we have experienced over the past four years. Addus offers a strong value proposition, and I am confident that we are well-positioned to achieve further profitable growth both organically and from acquisitions.”

Along with Bickham’s promotion, the Addus board of directors also named Dirk Allison as company chairman. The appointment is in addition to his current role as CEO.

“As I take on the chairman’s title, I appreciate the confidence in the board’s decision and look forward to continuing to serve Addus,” Allison said in a statement. “Since joining the company, it has been extremely rewarding to work with committed leaders across our organization with a shared mission to provide safe, high-quality home care services that allow individuals to remain in the preferred home setting.”

Moving forward, Steven Geringer — the previous chairman — will take on the role of lead director.

WelbeHealth names CMO

WelbeHealth — a Menlo Park, California-based operator of PACE programs — has appointed Dr. Sepideh Chegini its chief medical officer.

Programs of All-Inclusive Care for the Elderly (PACE) is a Medicare and Medicaid program that helps keep people in the community instead of a nursing home. Oftentimes, these programs are run out of community-based centers with the support of in-home care providers and their staff.

In her new role, Chegini will be in charge of clinical care delivery and oversee efforts to expand into underserved communities.

“We are grateful to have Sepi join WelbeHealth to help us ensure the highest quality care for our frail and vulnerable seniors,” Dr. Si France, founder and CEO of WelbeHealth, said in a statement. “Sepi has an extensive track record of leading and innovating within value-based care to drive exceptional clinical quality, an inspired culture, and satisfaction in patient-centered care.”

Prior to this role, Chegini was the senior medical officer at CareMore Health. She played an integral role in expanding CareMore Health’s Special Needs Plans (SNPs) which, among other things, provided care in the home.

Additionally, Chegini was the architect behind CareMore Health’s first palliative care program.

“I see it as a true privilege to be in this position and to serve our most precious and vulnerable seniors, establish meaningful human connections with them, enrich their overall health care experience, and support them on their journey so they can reach their full potential,” Chegini said. “I will work hard to evolve and grow our programs and support our team members so that we can impact more lives and help improve our participants’ quality of life.”

ConcertoCare adds new CMO

ConcertoCare has announced that Dr. Amy Flaster has joined the company as its chief medical officer. Earlier this year, in-home care providers ConcertoHealth and Perfect Health merged to form ConcertoCare.

Backed by Deerfield Management Company, ConcertoCare offers in-home primary care, virtual primary care and PACE services to dual-eligible seniors and those enrolled under Medicare Advantage.

In her new role, Flaster will head up clinical strategy and operations for ConcertoCare’s in-home health care services for seniors.

“Dr. Flaster has a remarkable track record of leveraging the latest clinical advancements, data and technology to improve patient outcomes for seniors and other populations with complex care needs,” Dr. Julian Harris, chairman and CEO of ConcertoCare, said in a statement. “A practicing primary care physician, Dr. Flaster is passionate about the intersection of population health, primary care and digital expansion. She brings invaluable experience as we further expand our tech-enabled in-home care model for seniors across the country.”

Before joining ConcertoCare, Flaster served as the senior vice president of population health at data and analytics technology provider Health Catalyst.

The Home Centered Care Institute announces president

The Home Centered Care Institute (HCCI) has named Julie Sacks its president.

Schaumburg, Illinois-based HCCI is a nonprofit organization that advocates for the expansion of home-based primary care.

“The need for home-based primary care has skyrocketed due to COVID-19, and interest in it has never been greater,” Sacks said in a statement. “HCCI is growing the workforce to meet this need — for millions of people across America.”

Sacks already served as the organization’s chief operating officer. In addition to her new role, Sacks will continue to serve as COO.

As president, Sacks will focus on developing strategic opportunities and partnerships, plus building relationships with donors. She will also function as a spokesperson for HCCI.

Sacks first joined HHCI in 2015 and has served as vice president of operations and advancement. Prior to this, she was senior director of programs and services at the National Young Onset Center for the American Parkinson Disease Association.

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LHC Group Inc. (Nasdaq: LHCG) has finalized acquisition agreements in Arizona and Oklahoma.

By doing so, the Lafayette, Louisiana-based home health, hospice and personal care services giant expands its scope of services in the Phoenix area while entering the Oklahoma hospice market for the first time.

Specifically, LHC Group has finalized its acquisition Grace Hospice in Tulsa, Oklahoma, a move expected to add annualized revenue of about $12.1 million moving forward. The purchase agreement was first announced in November.

Meanwhile, in Mesa, Arizona, LHC Group has completed its purchase of East Valley Hospice and East Valley Palliative Care. The Arizona deal, expected to add annualized revenue of about $4.8 million, was likewise first announced in November.

Overall, LHC Group’s existing hospice footprint spans more than 110 locations around the U.S. Broadly, its M&A strategy is largely focused on tri-locating home health, hospice and personal care services in key markets.

A-1 Preferred Sources acquires On The Mark Services

A-1 Preferred Sources has acquired On The Mark Services Inc. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Headquartered in Columbus, Ohio, A-1 Preferred Sources is a home health provider that cares for individuals throughout central Ohio, offering a range of in-home care services to both adult and pediatric patients. On The Mark Services is a supported-living agency that serves the same region.

With close to 50 employees, On The Mark supports adult patients with developmental disabilities across Franklin and Delaware counties. As a result of the acquisition, A-1 will be able to provide a seamless connection for its pediatric patients transitioning into adult care services, according to company leadership.

“We have these great kids we’ve been working with. We’ve seen them grow and have had caregivers with them for years, and now we can help them get out into the community as adults,” Sanjay Patel, president and owner of A-1 Preferred Sources, said in a statement. “On The Mark provides us with that foundation.”

On The Mark’s founder, Mark Stuntz, will join A-1 Preferred Sources in a new role.

“A-1 can offer our employees new opportunities by training as a home health aide and working on additional supported living sites,” Stuntz said. “Plus, the [our same] clients now have the added benefit of receiving all services from one provider.”

WelbeHealth announces rebrand

WelbeHealth — a Program of All-Inclusive Care for the Elderly (PACE) operator based in Melo park, California — is uniting all of its brands under the “WelbeHealth” name. The new branding is meant to emphasize the organization’s “cohesion across geographic areas,” according to the company.

Individual brands included programs formerly known as Stockton PACE, Pacific PACE and LA Coast PACE.

“From our shared mission and values to our remote home-based care model through the pandemic, we’ve always operated as one WelbeHealth,” founder and CEO Dr. Si France said in a statement. “Joining our programs more clearly under the WelbeHealth name will help us convey this unity to our participants and our communities.”

Effective Jan. 1, the organization’s programs will operate formally as WelbeHealth Sierra PACE, WelbeHealth Pacific PACE, WelbeHealth Coastline PACE and WelbeHealth Sequoia PACE.

PACE is a Medicare and Medicaid program that provides comprehensive medical and social services enabling older adults to live in the community instead of a long-term care facility.

Similar to other PACE operators, WelbeHealth shifted to a mostly remote home-based care model at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Traditionally, PACE models have often revolved around a center or hub, with wrap-around services also delivered in the home.

New Town Square location opens in Florida

There is a new Town Square location opening in the Sunshine State.

Town Square, pioneered by the George G. Glenner Alzheimer’s Family Center, is the center-based, reminiscence-therapy franchising model launched out of Senior Helpers.

Florida TS1 LLC, a franchisee of Town Square, will bring the concept’s first Florida location to Sarasota, having signed an 11,120-square-foot lease in the Oaks Plaza shopping center. Town Square Palmer Ranch, expected to open this summer, will be a 1950s-themed day center for seniors with Alzheimer’s and dementia.

Similar to other Town Square locations, the new facility will have a diner, theater, library, pub, city hall, health club and other storefronts. That’s on top of core care offerings.

Currently, Town Square concepts are open in Perry Hall, Maryland, and San Diego, California, with other locations expected to open soon in six other cities across the U.S.

Senior Helpers CEO previously described the Town Square model as an effective and affordable alternative to one-to-one home care for certain individuals.

“You have the 30, 40 or 50 million people who are in the [middle market] and might not have the money to pay for home care at $25 or $26 dollars an hour,” Ross previously told Home Health Care News. “They don’t qualify for Medicaid. They are not a veteran or a long-term care insurance policyholder. What do you do for them? I think Town Square offers that group a care option.”

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In light of the COVID-19 public health emergency, the new program will launch under a home-based care model, with the aim of providing safe care for seniors.

“Keeping our seniors safe and thriving is our top priority, so we’ve been aggressive in adapting our care model during the pandemic,” Paola Pouponneau-Nisbett, executive director at WelbeHealth, told Home Health Care News in an email.

PACE — or Programs of All-Inclusive Care for the Elderly (PACE) — is a Medicare and Medicaid program that helps keep people in their communities instead of the nursing homes. Oftentimes, these programs are run out of community-based centers with the support of in-home care providers and their staff.

For WelbeHealth, offering an alternative care option to nursing homes was especially important amid the public health emergency.

“Nursing homes have very tragically been the epicenter of many coronavirus outbreaks here in California and across the country, and seniors and their families are understandably concerned. PACE is a great alternative for many families,” Pouponneau-Nisbett said. “Though all PACE participants are nursing home-eligible, 95% are able to continue living at home with the support of our program.”

Under WelbeHealth’s new expansion, individuals will be able to enroll to receive home-based medical care, dental care, physical and occupational therapy, and personal care. WelbeHealth currently serves 400 members in its markets.

“We provide each participant with a free internet-connected tablet, enabling our doctors and caregivers to check in with our seniors regularly via video chat,” Pouponneau-Nisbett said. “We’re even conducting many of the games and social activities we’d typically do in-person remotely, helping our participants stay socially engaged while also physically distanced. When in-person medical care is needed, it’s provided by a single caregiver in the participant’s home whenever possible, minimizing potential for COVID exposure.”

The program will serve individuals in the Fresno, Kings, Madera and Tulare counties.

Currently, there are more than 130 PACE programs in 31 states. In total, the programs include 272 individual PACE centers serving more than 54,000 participants, according to the National PACE Association.

Looking ahead, WelbeHealth has future plans to further expand.

“In addition to the Fresno region, our programs in the Stockton-Modesto area and greater Los Angeles area are growing rapidly, and we’re excited to bring the PACE model to more new areas over time,” Pouponneau-Nisbett said.

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