Is the Wound Clinic a Dying Business?
- Janet S. Mackenzie, MD, ABPS, CWSP, AAGP
- December 20, 2019
Wound Care Centers have rapidly expanded over the past few years and the expansion has been driven by a variety of factors; however, there have been recent developments in the wound clinic industry that might suggest the business model is suffering. The model faces heightened levels of medical necessity review and scrutiny from various parties. The future of the wound clinic appears to be uncertain and may even be dying.
Many of the clinics were developed as joint hospital management company ventures. These partnerships placed emphasis on hyperbaric oxygen treatment (HBOT) as they looked to serve the nearly 7 million patients with chronic wounds.
In many instances the patients treated were the geriatric population and Medicare beneficiaries. These clinics often treated patients with HBOT daily requiring patients to return each day for “dives” in the chambers.
Medicare covers HBOT for 15 conditions most of which are not chronic wounds despite this wound clinics have offered an options for patients with wounds. However, as centers expanded the use of HBOT has not always been medically necessary. In fact, the Office of the Inspector General found that in one region alone 92% of HBOT claims were not medically necessary and Medicare incorrectly paid an estimated $39.7 million.
There is an alternative to clinics for both wound physicians working in them and for patients in need of care for chronic wounds. Vohra Wound Physicians was started 20 years ago when one physician working in a wound clinic saw a better way to care for wounds.
He developed a method that was cost effective, resulted in faster wound healing and reduced complications. A model that did not rely on HBOT but instead brought the wound physician to the patient. Delivering high-value evidence-based care is a passion and success at Vohra.
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