WHO WE ARE
The Texas Association for Home Care and Hospice (TAHC&H) represents more than 1,200 licensed Home and Community Support Services Agencies across the state of Texas. Our frontline health care workers provide medically necessary services in the home to Texas’ most vulnerable individuals with disabilities and significant illnesses.
State of the Industry
Texas’s home care and hospice providers are facing extraordinary challenges that impact their ability to provide quality, affordable in-home services for their patients. Especially following the pandemic and its effects on the workforce and our economy, the industry is fighting an unprecedented crisis.
Faced with workfduorce shortages; funding that can’t keep up with rising health care costs or inflation; and regulatory hurdles that delay industry innovation, home care providers in Texas can no longer keep up with the challenges they face on a daily basis.
Without action from our leaders, the home care industry and the 300,000 Texas families we serve, will be left without the care they rely on, driving up costs and leaving vulnerable patients at risk.
HOME CARE IN THE NEWS
COVID has drastically altered the future of home health care
Early in the pandemic, stories of exhausted ICU nurses went viral and people around the world applauded our brave medical providers. During the delta and omicron waves, hospital beds filled once again, and fatigued hospital staff left to seek out new careers. Today, the healthcare industry is confronted with increasing workforce shortages and skyrocketing inflation, all while contending with new challenges that persist as the nation moves on from the worst of COVID-19.
Nurse Shortage Hits Home Health Industry Leaving Families in Limbo
Several families in North Texas tell NBC 5 Responds they qualify for private duty nursing hours to help care for their medically fragile children but a shortage in nurses has made it nearly impossible to find help at home. Many qualify under a benefit provided by Medicaid to help families cover the costs for services—like round-the-clock care only a registered nurse can provide.