Home health agency profit orientation and risk for hospitalization: a propensity score analysis of population weighted data
Smith, L., Lapane, KL., Fennell, ML., Miller, EA., & Mor, V. (2008). Home health agency profit orientation and risk for hospitalization: a propensity score analysis of population weighted data. Home Health Care Services Quarterly, 27(3), 240-257. https://doi.org/10.1080/01621420802320025
evaluates the impact of HHA profit orientation on quality, measured as patient risk for hospitalization within 60 days of agency admission. Our sample (n = 1,304), from the National Home and Hospice Care Survey, comprised noninstitutionalized patients, 18 and older, including all payer types, discharged from free-standing HHAs. Our most deconfounded estimate, derived by propensity score adjusted, weighted polytomous logistic regression, yielded a for-profit hospitalization odds ratio of 1.31 but with a large confidence interval including unity. Results do not support our hypothesis of higher hospitalization risk for for-profit HHA patients.
