Comprehensive Care at Home in 2025 and Beyond

Each year, we take some time to reflect on the ongoing growth of our models of care at home, and 2024 was no exception to the continued success of Comprehensive Care at Home. In 2024, Contessa saw a shift in how health systems view their goals around bringing advanced care home to patients.  Over time, both clinical and operational workflows have been refined, and these models have experienced several years of consistent success, cementing a more long-term strategy for scaling these programs. 

We’ve seen this across several of our markets, with expansions of existing hospital-at-home programs with partners like Henry Ford Health and Penn State Health. As palliative care has gained importance, we’ve also seen increased adoption and growth of our Palliative Care at Home model. As we head into 2025, we expect to see these trends continue. Let’s take a closer look. 

Leaning into a long-term strategy 

The CMS Acute Hospital Care at Home waiver, originally extended through the end of 2024, is still in play after Congress extended the program through March of 2025. We anticipate, and are hopeful, that Congress will eventually pass a long-term extension in the coming months. The proven successes thus far of hospital at home have helped drive these ongoing conversations and have also contributed to the significant maturity and exponential growth of our programs at Contessa. of hospital at home have helped drive these ongoing conversations and have also contributed to the significant maturity and exponential growth of our programs at Contessa.  

The numbers reflect this well: overall, we’ve seen 31% average year-over-year (YoY) admissions growth since 2023 (and 85% since 2022!), with many markets seeing as much as 80-230% YoY growth in the past year. We’ve also achieved over 32,000 bed days saved for our joint venture partners since our first market opened in 2016. Our three service lines — Recovery Care at Home, in lieu of a hospital inpatient stay, Rehabilitation Care at Home, in lieu of a skilled nursing facility admission, and Palliative Care at home, allow health systems to expand the care they offer across the continuum, helping build a strong, scalable long-term strategy. 

The growth of palliative care 

Palliative care is especially driving growth and enthusiasm heading into 2025. Health systems and payers alike are recognizing its value and driving an estimated compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 9.93% in palliative care, and we’ve seen this growth play out in the ongoing success of Palliative Care at Home programs as well.  

With 1 in 6 people projected to be age 65 or older by 2050, and close to 80% of older adults living with two or more chronic conditions, palliative care is poised to become a major solution to helping manage serious illness and reduce unnecessary care and costs.  

In 2024, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) gave Contessa a vote of confidence in its providers’ ability to manage chronic and complex illness by selecting the company as one of 400 in the country who will be participating in the GUIDE model in 2025, a care model that offers specialized support to those living with dementia along with their caregivers. 

We can already see with Palliative Care at Home that the quality care management built into palliative care is supporting better patient outcomes, with patient engagement exceeding expectations and nearly 100% of patients in our palliative care programs having advance care planning/goals of care discussions within 30 days of admission. This leads to more patients successfully transitioning to hospice when appropriate. 

The proven value of the Contessa approach 

2024 reinforced what we’ve seen over nine years of high-acuity care in the home: our approach creates a foundation for the long-term growth of hospital at home and the full continuum of care. This is also because we offer something many other high-acuity care companies do not — we’re proud of the fact that we’re not just a vendor.  

By partnering with hospitals and taking on risk, we’ve built keys to success like a proven, integrated framework of care we bring to our joint ventures with our Virtual Care Unit (VCU), Recovery Care Coordinators (RCCs), nursing staff and established clinical workflows.  

With Comprehensive Care at Home, we add more than just a hospital floor with hospital at home — we also add rehabilitation care and palliative care as part of a larger growth and scalability mindset.  

2025 will most certainly bring further opportunities for growth and innovation. Contessa is well positioned to take advantage of these opportunities and is looking forward to the continued success of our care models as the future of healthcare is reshaped by care delivery in the home.