Submitting for the HRSA H8F COVID-19 Awards? Think Beyond Short Term

In April 2021, HRSA announced a $6.1 billion dollar investment as part of the American Rescue Plan to support health centers funded under the Health Center Program to prevent, mitigate, and respond to coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) and to enhance health care services and infrastructure.

As detailed on the HRSA award submission website, this opportunity provides one-time funding (H8F) to support health centers funded under the Health Center Program to:

• Plan, distribute and track COVID–19 vaccines, and to carry out other vaccine-related activities
• Monitor and mitigate the spread of COVID–19, testing, contact tracing, surveillance, mitigation, and treatment
• Purchase equipment and supplies to conduct mobile testing or vaccinations for COVID-19
• Establish, expand, and sustain a facility’s health care workforce
• Conduct community outreach and education activities related to COVID–19

Designing a Long Term Plan for Your Health Center
While short-term solutions took priority during COVID-19, with so much funding available, long-term planning for the future is a way to develop a comprehensive plan. Choosing the right tools and resources will ideally complete both short and long term missions.

Here’s how to think past short-term solutions, and design long-term plan for your health center:

Implement Telehealth and Virtual Care Technology
Telehealth is here to stay, and it’s important that practices shift their business model to accommodate this new era of virtual healthcare. Facilities should look to reconfigure space to maximize the ongoing use of telehealth technology, including detailed plans on how to expand and enhance health center telehealth capacity to perform triage, deliver care and more, including the use of home monitoring devices and video to provide care to patients in their homes, community settings, and other locations.

Source Proper Equipment and Supplies
To accommodate this new model of hybrid care, your facility should look to purchase equipment and supplies to support care, including clinical and diagnostic equipment, telehealth equipment, and IT systems to enhance data collection, exchange, reporting, and billing. Not only will this technology help you streamline processes, but it can help your facility maintain and increase capacity, expanding your ability to provide comprehensive care services.

Provide Proper Staff Training and Education
While staff may be more familiar with virtual care technology after 2020, it’s vital that both implementation training and continued learning is a priority. By training personnel appropriately on digital platforms, devices, and workflows, they can relieve symptoms of burnout and/or technology frustrations, ultimately allowing them to focus on what matters -- providing optimal patient care.

Support Care Transitions and Coordination
Look to support transitions in care settings and coordination with health care and public health partners to address changing needs. This is especially important for patients with chronic and or long-term health conditions. By improving care coordination, your health center can better communicate with other physicians and/or partners in a patient's care plans, paving the way for optimal patient outcomes.

Develop and Deploy Digital Tools to Support Patient Care
Patient engagement is an important step to ensuring optimal patient outcomes. The more engaged a patient is in their care plan, the more likely they are to follow treatment plans, eat right, exercise, and more. In fact, patients without the skills to manage their health care incur costs up to 21% higher than patients who are highly engaged in their care. This includes developing and/or enhancing software and digital applications to support patients’ access to and engagement in virtual care, including patient self-management tools, remote patient monitoring, patient portals, digital applications, websites, and use of social media.

Ensure Cybersecurity
Protecting patient data and ensuring your facility has a strong cybersecurity infrastructure is an important factor in deploying virtual care technology. From mobile device management to patient portals and digital applications, your facility should look to develop and implement plans for data risk management, mitigation and recovery, and update software and operating systems.

During COVID-19, many providers and health systems deployed short-term, temporary solutions to meet the immediate needs of their populations. Now that COVID-19 cases are leveling-out in the United States, providers and health systems alike are taking a step back to reevaluate the technology they have in place, and leverage new funding available to drive greater interoperability and flexibility in a way to provide personalized, value-based care while also achieving overall population health goals.

Eligible health centers can submit for the HRSA awards here.

Already submitted your plan?
If you've already submitted your plan for the HRSA awards, we would love to help you fulfill your virtual care delivery plans. Visit rimidi.com and contact us to learn how we can support your Remote Patient Monitoring, Chronic Care Management, virtual triage, and epidemic management goals.