TeleCare Connect
TeleCare Connect is a new service enabling rural skilled nursing facilities,
Rural Health Clinics, and Federally Qualified Health Centers to connect
to distant behavioral health professional specialists. AgeServe will
connect your facility to a behavioral health specialist of your choice.
Alternatively AgeServe can provide qualified specialists through the
affiliated Forefront Behavioral TeleCare Network. Until now specialist
could not economically serve these facilities and the facilities did
not have a way to access the specialists. Over 75% of rural counties,
representing a population of 60 million people, have no psychiatrist
and over 95% have no child psychiatrists. Nursing home residents in rural
America have had little or no access to these desperately needed professionals
leading to behavioral problems, drug management issues, regulatory friction
and high hospitalization rates.
TeleCare Connect’s ease of use, comprehensive support, and low
cost make behavioral Telehealth feasible and affordable for a smaller
healthcare facility for the first time.
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AgeServe provides comprehensive ongoing technical support to
both facility and specialist.
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AgeServe provides everything your facility needs,
sets it all up, and maintains it and trains and orients your staff. Each system is outfitted
with a 26” monitor, hands free echo canceling microphone, speakers
and digital camera, all of which is remotely monitored and maintained
by AgeServe.
Reimbursement: Effective January 1, 2009 the Centers
for Medicare and Medicaid Services officially added Skilled Nursing Facilities
(SNFs) to those facilities that can act as Originating Sites for Telehealth
connections. The nursing home must be outside a Metropolitan Statistical
Area or in a Health Professional Shortage Area. This means that specialists
can be reimbursed by Medicare and that the SNF can receive Facilities’ and
Presenter’s Fees. These fees can offset most or all the costs of
TeleCare Connect, and can even become a source of cash flow with very
small volume of usage. At the same time, the facility can provide critically
needed behavioral health to their residents.
Contact AgeServe at 415-883-3500 ext 102 to determine if your SNF is
eligible for this Medicare program.
Some states also provide for reimbursement under Medicaid for those residents
under 65 and who are not of a Medicare eligible for their physician services.
In addition several states have mandated that private insurance carriers
cover Telehealth consultation: CA, TX, OK, LA, OR, KY, NH, ME. Other
states like GA have virtually every private insurer in the state already
offering coverage. Many other states are considering mandates for this
coverage. Contact AgeServe for a complete list of private insurers that
cover Telehealth in your state and to determine if your skilled facility
qualifies for this service at 415-883-3500 ext 102.
Primary care Rural Health Clinics and Federally Qualified Health Centers
can now expand their practices to include behavioral health specialists
through TeleCare Connect. This helps mitigate persistent behaviorally
based problems among the populations they serve, and allows the Primary
Care Physicians to treat the root causes of many recurrent problems in
the patients they treat. Medicare will pay a Facilities’ Fee and
often a Presenter’s Fee for your senior patients. And AgeServe
pays member facilities a Video Presentation Fee for non-Medicare patients.
These fees make it possible for clinics to cover all the costs of TeleCare
Connect and more to contribute to their general overhead costs. At the
same time, critically un-served behavioral health needs are being addressed.
Contact AgeServe Today at 415-883-3500 ext 102 for complete details on
the economics of these programs to help you cover your monthly costs,
and more.
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