Physician Champion Award
Thomas Caprio, MD
Chief Medical Officer, UR Medicine Home Care
Rochester, NY
Dr. Caprio is an accomplished physician, successful administrator, engaging teacher, inspiring academic faculty member and a selfless volunteer. His expertise on quality initiatives and performance improvement, along with his mastery of regulatory issues, have helped shepherd UR Medicine Home Care through multiple successful state and federal surveys.
In addition to his home care and hospice medical director responsibilities at UR Medicine Home Care, he balances multiple teaching and administrative leadership positions at the University of Rochester. Since July 2015, he has overseen the federally-funded Geriatric Workforce Enhancement Program. His research projects have examined the quality of hospice care to older adults, home care for heart failure patients, and the benefits of home rehabilitative services in reducing rehospitalizations.
Dr. Caprio recently intervened in the case of an elderly patient with significant wound needs and multiple prior hospitalizations who was dropped from another physician’s primary care practice. Dr. Caprio found another practice for this patient and took over medical oversight of home care services during the two-month lag before the new provider could see the patient, all the while assuring that the arrangement was free from regulatory entanglements by declining to bill for the services; therefore, the agency and Dr. Caprio absorbed the cost of care.
While his expertise, professional commitment, and accolades are extensive, Dr. Caprio’s humanity is just as, if not more, noteworthy.
Physician Home Care Champion Award
This HCA award recognizes a physician in New York State who has demonstrated a strong and model commitment to home care patients and agency partners. The awardee will have engaged in an exemplary fashion with home care providers on: care management at home (through effective care-transitions, primary care house-calls, home care-directed telehealth, and other means); specific community health interventions that directly involve collaboration with a home care agency; and/or other home care-supportive leadership roles.