In 2022, the hospice community laid the groundwork for a transformational 2023. This year saw industry-changing acquisitions, some of the worst labor headwinds to date, the return of sequestration and a sometimes volatile national economy. During late 2021 and 2022, the U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) developed new approaches for enforcing hospice […]
Peterson-Kaiser Family Foundation
A fourth year into the pandemic, its effects have hospices continuing to combat against financial and operational headwinds, as well as uncertainty about the future of telehealth rules. The COVID-19 public health emergency (PHE) is likely to endure past another extension. Currently set to expire Jan. 11, 2023, the U.S. Department of Health & Human […]
Staffing issues have increasingly been at the root of leading causes behind shuttered hospice programs nationwide. Demographics are pushing up demand for end-of-life care amid long-standing staffing shortages in hospice. Some hospices have been unable to sufficiently fill their ranks to keep up with that demand for care, resulting in them either temporarily limiting new […]
Hospices have lost social worker employees at a faster rate than any health care setting in the care continuum. Social workers have left the health care field at record-high rates during the pandemic, according to data from the Peterson-Kaiser Family Foundation Health System Tracker. As of October 2021, attrition rates exceeded pre-pandemic levels by 35%. […]