Results from recent Optimal Aging pilot program show that home care and support framework reduced hospital readmissions for at-risk patients by 43% year over year

Feb. 21, BURLINGAME, Calif. – CareLinx Inc., the leading nationwide online home caregiver network, today announced its acquisition of the Optimal Aging program from Providence St. Joseph Health (PSJH), one of the nation’s largest health systems. The acquisition was effective as of February 5, 2019. Developed by PSJH’s Digital Innovation Group, Optimal Aging brings together non-clinical partner services -- such as home care, personal care, transportation and meal support -- to help older adults age safely in their homes. The program began operations in the Seattle area in February 2016, and has since expanded to the Oregon tri-county region as of April 2017. To date, the program has connected and supported more than 6,700 older adults. CareLinx has been the key technology and service partner of Optimal Aging since the program launch in 2016. This acquisition allows CareLinx to leverage Optimal Aging’s intellectual property to seamlessly enhance their partnerships with large payers and providers that share the aim of lowering readmission rates through established care management and transition programs.

“There’s no question that Optimal Aging has had a positive effect on the lives of thousands of older adults, and we’re very proud to be welcoming the program into the CareLinx family,” said Sherwin Sheik, President and CEO of CareLinx. “We know firsthand the importance of in-home care and support, and the difference that it makes to the people who receive it. The Providence St. Joseph Health team should be congratulated for pioneering such a forward-thinking program.”

CareLinx is both the industry’s leading national online home-care platform and a long-term partner of Optimal Aging. The company matches professional caregivers with the elderly, individuals with disabilities, and people with chronic health conditions, while its digital platform helps families and caregivers easily manage administrative tasks as well as seamless care coordination.

“We developed Optimal Aging initially because we saw that aging adults were no longer able to live in their homes safely by themselves, and when we delved into the problem we found a significant opportunity to help our patients with personal and domestics needs that impacted their wellbeing but weren’t clinical in nature,” said Aaron Martin, executive vice president and chief digital officer for Providence St. Joseph Health. “We believe the Optimal Aging model for helping adults age in place can be successfully scaled to reach more people and that CareLinx has the reach and depth of expertise for where the program needs to grow.”

Reducing readmissions
Most recently, Optimal Aging has run a pilot program as Providence St. Joseph Health’s post-discharge readmission reduction partner, in an effort to better address the social determinants of health as well as provide actionable insights for the care management team. That pilot program consisted of following 100 Providence St. Joseph Health Medicare Advantage members with similar admission diagnoses (such as sepsis, COPD and heart failure) over the course of a seven month period in 2018. During that time, the pilot group received in-home visits from CareLinx caregivers as well as check-in phone calls , and the program has reported positive preliminary findings. Although the size of the pilot did not allow for statistical significance, there was a trend of decreased hospital readmissions in this group over a 30-day episode post discharge. Only 16 percent of participants were readmitted, as compared to a typical re-admittance for a similar period in 2017 of 23 percent. This equates to a readmissions drop of 43 percent.

“The early results of the 2018 Optimal Aging readmission reduction pilot program are very encouraging. The decrease in hospital readmissions is clearly an outcome of better in-home care and support for the daily lives of the program’s participants,” said Sheik. “We’re thrilled with the pilot program’s findings and see this as a promise of even more successful outcomes for CareLinx customers in the future.”

The Optimal Aging program by CareLinx will continue to effectively integrate health systems across the healthcare ecosystem to provide the last mile of care, lowering overall costs and improving patient outcomes. Specifically, the program offers a one-stop shop for trusted and affordable services to help older adults stay in the comfort of their own homes for as long as possible. Services include:

  • Home care: Cleaning, laundry, pet care
  • Personal care: Bathing, dressing, medication reminders, tuck-in program
  • Transportation: Personal drivers with door to door service
  • Meals: Nutritious meal preparation, grocery shopping or meal delivery

These services are flexible and convenient, and all caregivers have been through a rigorous selection process to deliver high-quality services. The Optimal Aging array of services will continue to complement the offerings already provided by CareLinx. This plan and hospital experience demonstrates CareLinx’s ability to flex and partner across the entire healthcare ecosystem to deliver lower costs and deliver improved patient results.

Customers previously served under the Providence St. Joseph Health Optimal Aging program will continue to be served under CareLinx. Learn more about the CareLinx Optimal Aging program by visiting: https://optimalaging.carelinx.com/.

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About CareLinx
CareLinx is in-home care, fundamentally re-engineered with technology at its core. Professional caregivers leverage a proven digital platform and sophisticated mobile technology to assist people with activities of daily living and address social determinant factors of health for high risk members. With a nationwide network of over 300,000 tech-enabled caregivers, the CareLinx model dramatically improves transparency between clinicians and members as a proven “last mile” extender of care management teams, boosting health outcomes and reducing total cost of care. Already a trusted partner to numerous prominent national health payers and organizations, CareLinx has also recently been selected by AARP as the Preferred Nationwide Home Care Partner for their 35 million members nationwide. Learn more at www.carelinx.com/partners.

About Providence St. Joseph Health
Providence St. Joseph Health is a national, not-for-profit health system comprising a diverse family of organizations and driven by a belief that health is a human right. With 51 hospitals, 829 physician clinics, senior services, supportive housing and many other health and educational services, the health system and its partners employ more than 119,000 caregivers serving communities across seven states –Alaska, California, Montana, New Mexico, Oregon, Texas and Washington, with system offices based in Renton, Washington and Irvine, California. Visit us at https://www.psjhealth.org/.

CONTACT
CareLinx
(888) 280-4297
press@carelinx.com