Notes from 2011

Each year, Beloit College puts together a “mindset list” for its freshman class. For the students entering college this fall — the Class of 2011 — the list points out that Huey Newton, Emperor Hirohito, Ted Bundy and Abbie Hoffman have always been dead.

These freshmen have never lived with the Berlin Wall or without Hummers, and they have never “rolled down” a window. They pay for water in bottles. They get their news from television, yet they never saw the Johnny Carson show live. Tiananmen Square is a 2008 Olympics venue, not the scene of a massacre, and U2 has always been more than a spy plane.

They’re always texting 1 n other, and, according to the list, virtual reality has always been available when the real thing failed.

If you are an HME owner, this “mindset” probably reflects a world incredibly different than the one in which you began your company. It also reveals an incredible array of opportunities. The thing is, they may not be those on which you have always based your business.

Think about it. The business owner who enters HME this year may never have known this industry without national competitive bidding or an oxygen cap. His claims could all be electronic, and Medicare might not be one of his payers. He could be counting the money in his cash register instead of waiting on reimbursements. He might invest in home transfill systems and POCs instead of delivering oxygen tanks.

Try as we might to keep things the way they have always been, the world just keeps changing. People change. Needs and attitudes change. Governments change.

For years, there has been a store near HomeCare’s offices called Cakes ‘n Things. Although cake is my favorite dessert, I never went in the store. Apparently neither did many other people, because when I drove by last week, the sign had changed to Wings ‘n Things. Kind of a drastic switch, but the store owners must have felt it necessary since Cakes ‘n Things had lost whatever appeal it once held.

It must be daunting for longtime company owners who, after years of doing business the same way, are forced to change in response to market conditions or, in this industry’s case, to ill-conceived legislation and regulation. For HME providers faced with this situation, changing products or payers won’t be easy decisions to make or to implement.

I don’t mean to imply that traditional methods will no longer work; the circumstances will be different for each HME. I do know that the changes taking place in this industry are monumental. No matter where you are located, inside or outside of a competitive bidding area, you will not escape. If you choose not to become accredited, for example, you will have to figure out how to get along without Medicare business. And if you go into retail, you are looking at a business model that is completely different.

HME’s new business owners, however, aren’t carrying your baggage. They have not fought your legislative and regulatory battles. They are looking at the industry’s opportunities as they now exist, not as they were yesterday. They will operate their companies based on what is possible under the government’s new mandates, and they will be focused on the baby boomers, those soon-to-be beneficiaries who may expect to pay out-of-pocket for medical equipment if it will make their lives easier.

I’m guessing the jury on Wings ‘n Things will be out for awhile. But I suspect that after the dust has settled should competitive bidding be fully implemented, this year’s new HME providers — the industry’s own Class of 2011 — will be among the survivors when that year rolls around. I hope you will be, too.