FREE Meal On The Cutting Edge of Care
DSNP members in Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield's home state --INDIANA--can get up to 10 day's worth of meals when they come home from a hospital stay. When Anthem announced this I had an Ah Ha moment and I'm betting that all the other carriers did too.
This is a great idea that really sets Anthem's DSNP apart from the pack as research shows that providing healthy meals to recently hospitalized Medicare beneficiaries reduces re admissions up to 39% (based on a pilot program in Florida.)
Anthem will help fragile seniors when they are recovering from a hospital stay with free, healthy meals.
Here is a sample meal: Turkey sausage with peppers, onions and tomatoes served with whole grain rotini pasta and apple chunks and raisins. Plus all meals are served with dairy beverage, bread, fruit, juice or dessert.
GA foods delivery staff will also work to help your clients stay healthy. They will check to see if the Senior is eating their meals, if their house has overloaded electrical sockets or there are potential risks for for falls in the house. Ritch Brandon, senior vice president for marketing and strategy at GA Foods stated that 1/3 of patients are malnourished before they entered the hospital and almost 1/5 of Medicare patients return the hospital within 30 days of discharge.
Carriers, hospitals and nursing homes all lose rating points with CMS when there is a re admission within 30 days of discharge. That translates into lower reimbursements, so there is a lot of money on the line to prevent these re admissions. Making sure the member has food, is a great step in the right direction!
