Healthmonix Advisor

I was intrigued by a recent Becker’s article which outlines the results of Mount Sinai’s use of the “Hospital at Home” model for acute care. According to the article, patient experience showed improvement and readmission rates were noticeably lower. I had to know more, so I decided to do some research into exactly what this model of care looks like.

 The 2018 winter Olympics wrapped up this weekend in PyeongChang, leaving us at Healthmonix contemplating the many analogous connections between the Olympian athletes and providers of value-based care. So in honor of this year’s champions, we’re laying out why you should follow their example and go for the gold:

1. If you want to place, strive for peak performance.

Living squarely in Eagles territory with the big game less than a week away, I've noticed several correlations between the journey to becoming a winning football team and the implementation of a winning value-based care strategy.  A successful transition to VBC requires time, deliberation, and dedication to improving quality outcomes.  Sharing a vision isn't enough. There must be a greater commitment by the whole team to do what is necessary to achieve greatness.  Nothing good ever comes easily, so the key to winning is to keep your eye on the prize.  Here are just a few pro-tips for paving your way to victory:

Hospital readmissions can be bad news for patients, but they can also be bad news for a hospital’s bottom line. Readmissions cost $41.3 billion overall, a majority of which—about $26 billion annually—is paid by Medicare. Moreover, as much as $17 billion of Medicare-paid readmissions are considered to be avoidable.

Value-based payment models aim to address rising healthcare costs, clinical inefficiency and duplication of services. To survive in an industry with increasing competition a solid understanding of the business case for implementing value based care is imperative.

The most notable value based care program currently is the MACRA Quality Payment Program, which provides the option to participate in MIPS or an advanced APM. If you’ve been keeping up with our blog posts recently you may already know that the deadline for the last MIPS performance period of the year is October 2nd, and that as long as you start collecting data by that date you will be able to report successfully.