Innovive Health has entered a new state. The in-home care provider, which specifically serves complex behavioral health patients, has opened up shop in Colorado.
The company already completes more than 20,000 patient visits per week in Massachusetts. And while it sees Colorado – and Colorado Springs, specifically – as an area with a high need for its services, Innovive CEO Joe McDonough believes the need is high nearly everywhere in the U.S.
“This need really exists in every state in the country,” McDonough told Home Health Care News. “But it’s about a state that’s really focused on really creating an environment where this population can access services. Colorado has a Medicaid program that supports the type of services we provide.”
Based in Medford, Massachusetts, Innovive has been around for nearly two decades. More recently, however, it has become one of the more quickly growing home-based care providers in the Northeast. It takes a “data-driven approach” to caring for a population with complex behavioral health needs. Those patients are more likely to be high utilizers of services compared to traditional Medicare home health beneficiaries.
The company leverages nurses as well as specialists “across the continuum of care” to care for these patients. It also leverages a cloud-based infrastructure and a fully integrated EMR.
McDonough previously told HHCN that the patient population Innovive cares for is the “most underserved population in the country.”
The company has already has a small team of nurses in Colorado Springs. It also recently hired a clinical director.
“Colorado has more of a commitment to provide care for their severely mentally-ill population,” McDonough said. “They have a suicide rate that’s significantly higher than the general population – 22.1 people for every 100,000 people compared to 13.1 to every 100,000 people nationwide. It’s a severe need for Colorado, and we’re excited to be there.”
Caring for Innovive’s patient population in the home – as opposed to in the emergency department or elsewhere – is far less expensive.
There are at least 28,000 Medicaid beneficiaries living with serious mental illness in the Colorado Springs area alone, and more if dually eligible individuals are included.
In Colorado, there are not enough brick-and-mortar facilities to care for that population, which leads to poor cost and health outcomes. About 43% of patients in Colorado Springs in need of mental health services were unable to access them in the last year, according to Innovive.
The average hospitalization costs around $38,000. Meanwhile, a full year of Innovive’s home health services cost about $25,000, the company said.
“We work within the patient’s home, we look at social determinants,” McDonough said. “We try to cater this treatment plan to the patient to make sure the patient is as successful as possible. … We can save payer sources roughly $200,000 per year, per patient. And at the same time, create much more positive outcomes and a much better quality of life.”
The need in the U.S. for behavioral health care is immense. Even more traditional Medicare-certified home health providers have become far more focused on behavioral health care of late.
Innovive’s Colorado operation launched on April 1. Its census includes about 10 patients currently. The company is looking to build brand awareness to bring in more patients and staff over the next year as the operation scales.
Ultimately, the goal is to get to the Denver market within the next year. It hopes to get to a third state by the end of 2024, and after that, to get more funding to expand dramatically into an additional 10 states.
“This need is there, everywhere,” McDonough said. “So, we do the research on [certain areas]. But ultimately, you can talk to anyone who works in any facility in the country and they’ll tell you that the need is there.”
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