New home care group sets bold agenda for the future
By MATTHEW HAY
HHBR Washington Correspondent
WASHINGTON The newly formed American Federation of Home Care Providers (AFHP) held its first board meeting in Washington, DC, last week where it established an ambitious plan for the new organization. Ann Howard, AFHP’s vice president of national policy and member benefits, said the new organization represents "an exciting new model" that emphasizes value-added services in combination with the more traditional functions of an association.
Last month, the American Federation of Home Health Agencies (AFHHA) announced it was merging with U.S. Health Networks and its affiliates. AFHHA’s existing board of directors will serve as the Membership Advisory Board pending the election of a new board of directors. AFHP will have offices in Washington, DC, that focus on legislative and regulatory issues, as well as an office outside Washington that manages administrative functions.
U.S. Health Networks is made up primarily of consultants and certified public accountants, many of whom have long-standing relationships with AFHHA members. That group also specialized in meetings and communications. AFHHA, which represented mainly independent home health agencies, was reportedly hard-hit last year when the home health industry took a beating under IPS.
"We are organizing and getting ready for the next phase," said Ann Howard, who managed AFHHA for more than 10 years. "We have a lot of new energy and new faces joining many of the existing executives that have been active with AFHHA, and that makes this an exciting and promising venture," Howard told HHBR. "Through this restructured organization, we will be able to provide our members with many more support services and an abundance of information using state-of-the-art technology that will allow us to disseminate information almost instantly."
Howard said the organization will work on many of the same issues, but will emphasize providers’ rights to receive "fair and decent treatment" by HCFA. "Some of these issues such as equitable reimbursement are issues we have worked on in the past," said Howard. "But we will have abundantly more resources to work on them now." AFHP expects to hold several meetings each year.
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