Hospitals and other acute care facilities aren’t referring post-acute care to skilled nursing facilities as much as they have in the past four years, with a significant decline between 2019 and 2020, according to a report released by Trella Health.
Data gathered by the Atlanta-based health analytics company shows a drop from 21.5% in facility referrals in 2019 to 19.1% in 2020.
However, post-acute care facilities overall saw an increase in referrals, going from 48.1% to 50.3%.
Carter Bakkum, senior data analyst at Trella and author of the report, believes the SNF-specific drop was due to a different population entering inpatient stays, since elective surgeries were suspended during the pandemic.
Another possibility for a drop in SNF referrals is the addition of inpatient rehabilitation wings at hospitals, the report said, leading to internal patient referrals.
“[The hospitals’] attempt to retain revenue from post-acute care had unintended consequences of decreasing SNF referrals for appropriate patients,” explained Bakkum in the report.
By comparison, referrals to home health have risen from 21.1% to 23.6% of total hospital discharges between 2019 and 2020, the report said. This is a reflection of patient preference to receive home care during the pandemic.
“Considering this, the increasing movement toward home health discharge instructions – combined with lower home health adherence – could be a significant factor driving the decrease in inpatient discharges despite increased PAC discharge instructions,” Bakkum added in the report.
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