Amedisys Applauds Start of CMS Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation

BATON ROUGE, La., Nov. 18, 2010 /PRNewswire/ -- Amedisys, the country's leading home health care and hospice company today applauded the establishment of the CMS Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation (CMMI), which was announced on Tuesday.

"We are in full support of the projects that CMMI will be undertaking because we believe they will allow health care solutions to come to the forefront that will show real value in improving patient care, providing seamless care and enhancing prevention," said Michael Fleming, Chief Medical Officer for Amedisys. "Amedisys has already been a part of several CMS demonstration projects and we look forward to continuing to work with CMS to innovate and advance seamless and state-of-the-art home care."

The CMS demonstration projects that Amedisys has participated in include the Quality Improvement Organization Program, the Home Health Quality Improvement National Campaign, the Medicare Home Health Pay for Performance Demonstration project and the Post Acute Care Demonstration project (PAC Demo).

About Amedisys:

Amedisys, Inc. (Nasdaq: AMED) is the nation's leading health care company focused on bringing home the continuum of care. Each day Amedisys delivers personalized health care services to more than 35,000 individual patients and their families, in the comfort of patients' homes. Amedisys has two divisions, home health care and hospice, and employs more than 16,000 skilled clinicians across the country. The Company's state-of-the-art advanced chronic care management programs and leading-edge technology enables it to deliver quality care based upon the latest evidence-based best practices. Amedisys is a recognized innovator, being the first in the industry to equip its clinicians with point-of-care laptop technology and referring physicians with an internet portal that enables real-time coordination of patient care seamlessly. Amedisys also has the industry's first-ever nationwide Care Transitions program. Amedisys Care Transitions is designed to reduce unnecessary hospital readmissions through patient and caregiver health coaching and care coordination, which starts in the hospital and continues throughout completion of the patient's home health plan of care. For more information about the Company, please visit: www.amedisys.com.

SOURCE Amedisys, Inc.