Improving Compliance and Patient Care with Electronic Visit Verification for Home Health

Identifying the Problems

At the federal level, home health EVV requires six sets of criteria to meet the 21st Century Cures Act standards. These include:

• Service Type
• Patient Information
• Service Date
• Service Location
• Caregiver Information
• Service Start and End Time

Caregivers typically excel at providing care – however, administrative tasks can get in the way. As a result, consistently documenting the above criteria isn't as straightforward as it might seem. Here are some issues we've seen home health companies face with EVV solutions.

Consistency Issues

Caregivers often view administrative tasks as distractions to what they do best – providing care. Without enablement and process-driven workflows, caregivers might neglect to collect all six criteria or verify a visit. Even if the visit was productive, this could lead to significant compliance issues.

Patient Connectivity Issues

Some patients reside in rural areas with limited internet access. Furthermore, the 21st Century Cures Act does not mandate that Medicaid beneficiaries have an internet connection, cell phone, or landline to assist with the verification process. If the electronic visit verification (EVV) solution selected by a home health provider relies on an internet connection for verification, that will probably result in compliance challenges.

Administrative Errors

EVV solutions that depend on manually entered data are susceptible to errors. Such inaccuracies can result in compliance issues with the 21st Century Cures Act and undermine the services' legitimacy.

Solving the Use Case

At Penrod, we implement Salesforce Mobile in our home health platforms for electronic visit verification. Salesforce Mobile is a HIPAA-compliant solution that automatically populates data for the six verification criteria.

For instance, the patient management platform populates patient details, service type, location, and caregiver info. In the case of our home health platform, we use Salesforce Health Cloud as the patient management platform, which connects healthcare data from ERPs, clinical systems, and marketing tools.

Additionally, visit duration and calendar date are automated based on when the caregiver started and ended a visit. These automations reduce administrative burden, ensure consistency, and enforce compliant verification at every visit.

Here's a look at how it all comes together:

Here are some additional features of Salesforce Mobile:

• Automating Billable Hours
  Streamlined tracking of billable hours, ensuring accurate billing and payment processes.
• Guided Workflows
  If required criteria for Home Health EVV aren't automatically populated, Salesforce Mobile includes guided workflows that help caregivers capture essential information, such as service type, patient details, and location. Workflows ensure that all necessary data is collected consistently.
• Attaching Verification Directly to Patient Profiles
  Verification is seamlessly integrated into patient profiles, making it easy to audit verifications for each patient.
• Real-Time Record Verification
  Caregivers can record verification in real-time, providing immediate updates and maintaining accurate verification records.
• Enforcing Compliance
  The platform is designed to enforce compliance with state and federal-level EVV requirements, helping home health companies meet regulatory standards while improving the quality of patient care.

Conclusion

Electronic visit verification with Salesforce Mobile addresses the consistency, connectivity, and administrative challenges often associated with EVV systems.

Automated data population and guided workflows help caregivers focus more on delivering high-quality patient care, and less on administrative tasks. Using a scalable platform like Salesforce Mobile ensures the future of home healthcare is accessible, compliant, and patient-centric.