Skilled home health care is an insurance-driven medical service delivered wherever is home at the time of need – your house, apartment, or assisted living residence. Skilled home care is prescribed by your doctor as a temporary or intermittent service, to get you back on your feet.
Visiting Nurses
Here in northwest Ohio, you may be familiar with the term “visiting nurses” – another name for home health care. Forty-eight years ago, CHP Home Care & Hospice was founded as a visiting nurse association (VNA).
You may be eligible to receive skilled home care upon discharge from a hospital or a rehab facility, or from your doctor if he or she sees the need. Home care also may be appropriate if you start taking a new medication that requires monitoring, are healing from a wound, need help with strengthening, or are learning to navigate a new physical situation in your home.
You might also be eligible to receive therapy services at home.
Team approach
The team who may care for you includes a registered nurse, physical, occupational, and speech therapists, a home health aide, and Social Worker. This team works in conjunction with each other to help you heal after an injury, operation, illness, or another physical setback.
CHP Home Care nurses oversee and coordinate all aspects of your care.
Medicare does not pay for custodial care like a daily bath, help with getting dressed, or basic assistance in the home. This type of care is available from CHP on an hourly, private-pay basis (Private Duty Services)
How to begin receiving home health care
Simply, call us! CHP will take care of ALL these requirements for you:
- A doctor must order home health care and sign the plan.
- A face-to-face meeting with the patient and family members to cover what care and services are needed.
- The plan of care and certification will last up to 60 days.
- The 60-day plan of care should be recertified if the patient is improving, and the doctor must sign to approve the recertification period.
Requirements
- You must be homebound (which means it is a taxing effort to leave home) for the duration of the service. Being homebound does not mean you cannot go to church or to appointments, but it does mean that you are not leaving home on a regular basis.
- You must also have a need for these medical services, as determined and prescribed by your doctor.
You can always advocate for skilled home care services with your doctor, as you know your needs better than anyone else.
If skilled home care is prescribed for you, remember to ask for a referral to CHP Home Care & Hospice. Not all agencies are created equal and you always have a choice.
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