Homecare Champion Kam Yuricich on building relationships

COLUMBUS, Ohio – Kam Yuricich, who was crowned the 2023 Van Miller Homecare Champion at Medtrade in March, credits relationship building for the successes she’s helped to achieve on the state and federal level in her 37-year and counting career in the HME industry. 

Here’s what the executive director of the Ohio Association of Medical Equipment Services (OAMES) and the Great Lakes Home Medical Services Association had to say about how relationship building increases credibility, inspires teamwork and more. 

HME News: When AAHomecare named you this year’s Homecare Champion, the association cited your work securing relief for providers in Ohio and Indiana through funds from the American Rescue Plan Act, among other accomplishments. What’s the secret to your success? 

Kam Yuricich: I can say, wholeheartedly, that my biggest takeaway from years of doing this is the importance of relationship building. It’s rapport with government officials as trusted, reliable partners in building a strong HME benefit that has them listening to what we have to say, increasing credibility for our industry. A huge hurdle we have as a health care provider in the continuum of care is that we represent 1% or 2% of the overall spend, so you lean on those relationships to get attention and effect positive change in a very busy world.  

HME: What are some of the bigger successes you’ve played a part in from your perspective? 

Yuricich: I’m super proud of obtaining those ARPA funds for providers in Ohio and Indiana. The opportunity was there through the act, but we had to step up and fight for it. Our OAMES president testified; I testified. It took a long time and incredible persistence to earn that financial relief for our members.  While the effort focused on ARPA funds, it was bigger than that. It was planting a flag that HME providers are a critical sector in health care delivery. I’m also super proud of how, in the early days of Medicare’s competitive bidding program and what felt like the height of the fraud and abuse stories, we stepped forward in Ohio to get licensure for HME providers. We wanted to establish consumer protections and professional business practices, in response. We wanted to be able to say, “Here’s what we did, as an industry, to take responsibility.” That proactive approach gained recognition and accountability as a valued healthcare provider. 

HME: What was your response to being named Homecare Champion? 

Yuricich: It’s a huge honor but, more so, incredibly humbling, because it’s never just one person that achieves anything. It’s a lot of teamwork. It’s a lot of great leadership by our providers and by my fellow counterparts at state/regional associations. We inspire each other and pick each other up, all so we can keep the needle moving. And we do it because we believe in home care – I believe it was my dear friend Mal Mixon who once said it’s the trifecta of where patients want to be, where care is most cost-effective for payers and where you have the best outcomes and quality of life.