Bipartisan Policy Center Endorses Medicare Expansion to Cover Home Modifications

A report issued by the Bipartisan Policy Center analyzed alternatives for reducing medicare costs for it’s high-need, high-risk patients, specifically those “who are not dual eligible for full Medicaid benefits, reside in the community setting, have three or more chronic conditions, and have functional or cognitive impairment.” For these roughly 3.65 million beneficiaries, the report concludes that providing additional services such as meal delivery, home modifications, case management and transportation would reduce total medicare costs. Home modifications is singled out as the additional covered service that would provide the highest return on investment (ROI).

Adoption of the recommendations are not anticipated any time soon in the current regulatory environment. However, the objective endorsement of home modifications by such a respected body is extremely encouraging, especially since the analysis concluded a favorable ROI while looking at a large percentage of medicare beneficiaries. One can imagine that the ROI for home modifications would only become greater as the cut of recipients is further targeted towards the highest risk seniors. This should be exciting news for integrated health care providers, ACO’s, and long-term care insurers who can leverage big data to identify those recipients who would most benefit from sponsored modifications. This endorsement and evidenced based ROI analysis should be boon to community agencies and home modification providers seeking to expand their services.