Bloom Healthcare Looks To LEAD Model, Technology To Support In-Home Primary Care 

In-home primary care provider Bloom Healthcare is looking to expand its in-home primary care model, leveraging technology and looking to an upcoming Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) model. 

The provider has found that an AI-powered ambient listening tool improves efficiency while maintaining human connection, and is using the technology as one way to support the care it provides to homebound patients with complex conditions.

The company’s in-home model involves partnering with home health, hospice and wound care providers to close gaps in care.

“The patients that we see are homebound, meaning the majority of them no longer drive… If we need a chest x‑ray, we have to find a company that will actually go into their home,” TeriAnn Benson, clinical director of strategy and innovation at Bloom, told Home Health Care News. “One of the other major gaps in care that we have uncovered is getting quality home health and hospice into the home as well.”

Lakewood, Colorado-based Bloom Healthcare offers in-home primary care, behavioral healthcare and care management to patients in Colorado, Texas and Missouri.

Bloom began “dabbling” with an AI medical scribe, Sunoh.ai, a few years ago, Benson said. The technology had some issues at first, she said, including cellular service gaps that made it cumbersome for clinicians. But the technology has evolved, she said, and while it has a learning curve, it’s become an essential tool to close the gap between support team and provider functions.

“The technology just advanced so significantly that it really became a no-brainer,” Benson said. “We could not say no to using this, because ultimately the amount of time and efficiency, and then the quality of the note that you can produce while still maintaining eye contact with our patients.”

While utilizing the technology, Bloom has achieved significant savings through the ACO REACH (Accountable Care Organization Realizing Equity, Access, and Community Health CMS model. For performance year 2023, the provider touted a gross savings rate of 24.6%.  

“We have been specifically in the high-needs ACO REACH, and I think that we’ve done a really good job of partnering and advocating for patients [who] have so many complex conditions that they have never been able to advocate for themselves, because again, they’re homebound,” Benson said.

ACO REACH is sunsetting at the end of 2026, to be replaced by the 10-year voluntary Long-term Enhanced ACO Design (LEAD) Model.

Bloom is awaiting additional operational guidance before finalizing its transition plan, Benson said. Still, the company’s approach remains the same: educating clinicians and staff to have the most up-to-date information so they can provide or support care for complex patients.

“I think that because of our investment in our team and our commitment to staying up to date with our interventions is how we have best been preparing to lead the country in days at home for ACO and are working towards doing the same for the LEAD program,” Benson said.

Looking to the future, Bloom plans to expand in metro areas with gaps in access to care, Benson said. 

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