Our Position – Enabling equitable access to Hospital in the home across the private sector

Australia’s private hospitals are under increasing strain. Demand for services continues to grow, driven by the latent effects of COVID-19, alongside the longer-term trends of population ageing and the changing burden of disease. At the same time, financial performance is in decline, as operating profits continue to be squeezed by cost-push inflation, unfunded capital expenditure, and increasingly unsustainable funding models.

In responding to these challenges, private hospitals must look beyond the traditional supply-side levers of infrastructure investment and workforce capacity. Solutions will instead require more adaptive and innovative models of care that – by utilising advances in digital health – can deliver high-quality services beyond ‘bricks-and-mortar’ (BAM) hospitals.

Out-of-hospital (OOH) models such as Hospital in the home (HITH) represent a key component of this shift. HITH is an inpatient equivalent model that delivers hospital-level care in a person’s home. It promotes greater choice by allowing patients to decide where and how they receive their care, whilst offering potential benefits to private hospitals by unlocking latent capacity and reducing capital expenditure.

CHA has long advocated for HITH as an effective and necessary solution to easing pressures on the health system. Yet HITH continues to be underutilised in the private sector. Under current financial arrangements, private hospitals are disincentivised from delivering HITH at scale, while inconsistent governance and ‘managed care’ models have further stymied adoption.

Addressing these issues will be key to unlocking the significant potential of HITH. To do so, we recommend that the Commonwealth Government: