Roji Intel Blog

Theresa Hush 0
10
Consumers & PatientsFuture of Health CareValue-Based Health Care
December 18, 2019

Bottom Line: Can Consumers Survive Value-Based Health Care?

As 2019 nears its close, health care has reached a crossroads. Value-Based Health Care was intended to clarify consumer choices and motivate providers to offer high value services that improved outcomes, as well as to improve patient access to those services. But has that goal been realized? Has anything really changed? Or are health care consumers even worse off than before? Since September, we've been evaluating the consumer perspective of Value-Based Health Care, examining whether the movement is helping consumers achieve affordability, better choices, and good quality. We’ve focused on two central questions: Is Value on the right track? Has…
Read More
Evelyn Herwitz 0
0
ACOsAlternative Payment Models (APM)Merit-Based Incentive Payment System (MIPS)Primary Care PracticesValue-Based Health Care
October 23, 2019

Roji News Roundup: Fall 2019 Edition

In a range of recent industry publications, Roji Health Intelligence CEO Terry Hush shares her insights on the latest moves by CMS and health care trends: Are Value-Based Models Helping or Hindering Care Delivery for Primary Care Providers AJMC Managed Markets Network, October 10, 2019 This article by Jaime Rosenberg summarizes Terry’s presentation at the National Managed Care Physicians 2019 Fall Managed Care Forum in Las Vegas. Value-based models continue to enter the health care system, affecting a variety of fields, including primary care. And while success stories have been shared by payers and CMS touts these models as a…
Read More
Evelyn Herwitz 0
2
Future of Health CareValue-Based Health CareWomen and Health Care
June 19, 2019

Roji News Roundup: Industry Insights from CEO Theresa Hush

From women’s health care to the future of the Affordable Care Act, Roji Health Intelligence CEO Terry Hush has shared her insights with numerous industry publications in recent months. Here’s a sampling of current articles: Value-based arrangements in ASCs — 3 quotes from an industry CEO Becker’s ASC Review | June 11, 2019 Terry’s predictions, based on 25 years of industry experience, for what to expect for the future of risk-based agreements. Hint: Episodes of care and bundled payments will become increasingly important. The Future of Healthcare: “Make tools available for women so that they can have a real voice…
Read More
Theresa Hush 0
1
MedicarePrimary Care PracticesValue-Based Health Care
June 5, 2019

Can Small PCPs Succeed in Medicare’s Primary Care First?

Medicare’s announced primary care models will provide an interesting test of whether financially-motivated primary care practices (PCPs) can improve hospital utilization, the key outcome measure that will determine provider revenues under the pilot. While provider risk for costs of patient care is inevitable for most physicians in the future, providers don’t have the same potential for financial success. That is especially true for PCPs, whose volume and roles in health care have been eclipsed by specialists and industry consolidation. Whether Value-Based Health Care can restore primary care to a central role of coordination—with the potential for cost reduction—is at the…
Read More
Theresa Hush 0
3
ACOsFuture of Health CareValue-Based Health Care
May 8, 2019

How Will New Primary Care Models Affect Providers in VBHC?

Embraced by some provider groups and disparaged by others, CMS’s five new payment models for practices focused on primary care include much to consider. All reflect a key departure of Medicare’s Value-Based Health Care (VBHC) efforts to date: they are direct efforts by Medicare to transition physician practice revenues to risk without the necessity of ACO participation. The primary care models will affect both providers and patients. In this article, we’ll address the provider issues. How patient choice of care and outcomes for patients and patient populations will be affected deserves dedicated scrutiny in a future post. No Surprise that…
Read More
Theresa Hush 0
0
Consumers & PatientsFuture of Health CareValue-Based Health CareWomen and Health Care
May 1, 2019

Do “Women’s Health Centers” and Services Deliver on Value-Based Health Care?

Women make an astounding 80 percent of health care decisions for themselves and their families. But there’s a disconnect between what women need and how providers have organized health care for them. While Value-Based Health Care (VBHC) is struggling to achieve more value for every health care dollar spent, providers are simultaneously sabotaging women in their customer base. How? This might surprise you: through promotion of “women’s health” services. While providers may have good intentions for offering a dedicated place for women’s health needs, those services have actually fragmented care for women, especially those with more complex conditions. Let’s evaluate…
Read More
Theresa Hush 0
0
ACOsPerformance ImprovementRisk
April 17, 2019

Bootstrapped ACOs Facing Risk? Adopt Cost Strategies With Long Term RoI

The experimental phase of Medicare ACOs has been officially declared dead, per CMS. Going forward, ACOs must agree to take on financial risk for expenditures beyond their targets. That’s sobering news for the majority of ACOs still struggling to succeed. The reality is that most ACOs are bootstrapped—light on extra funding and dependent on existing tools to do more. In fact, about two-thirds of ACOs report that funding is their most significant challenge. And that is probably understated, since patient engagement problems (also reported by two-thirds of ACOs) and lack of data (reported by 40 percent) are remedied by solutions…
Read More
Thomas Dent, M.D. 0
3
Future of Health CareMedical EducationPerformance Improvement
December 19, 2018

There’s More to be Learned from Good Results than Bad—and Why It Matters

Becoming a physician requires passing many tests, beginning with premed studies, all the way through residency and, ultimately, board certification. You spend countless hours focused on passing examinations or rotations and learning to avoid pitfalls. As a residency program director, I and my colleagues invested considerable effort to determine which residents were struggling and to develop strategies to help them. We focused on finding deficiencies that would impede them from being excellent physicians. A fellow faculty member ran a Morbidity and Mortality conference that he nicknamed the “boo-boo” conference. This process of identifying and analyzing medical errors produced competitive physicians,…
Read More
Theresa Hush 0
1
ACOsPopulation HealthValue-Based Health Care
November 14, 2018

How to Involve Physicians Effectively in ACO Population Health

In a recent post, we addressed the many types of population health initiatives and some guidelines for creating the most benefit. Now let’s take a closer look at one of those guidelines: integrating population health into regular or routine care of patients—specifically, with greater involvement and communication by the patients’ physicians. ACOs and their participating physicians have an opportunity to break with the historical obstacles between the physician’s employer organization and the physician, especially in hospital-directed ACOs. Even in physician-led ACOs, working seamlessly with physicians to achieve better health for ACO patients is key to achieving both quality and cost…
Read More
Theresa Hush 0
1
ACOsFuture of Health CareMedical Decision-MakingValue-Based Health Care
October 3, 2018

Why ACOs Must Build Trust with Providers and Patients to Meet Goals

As ACOs develop approaches to Value-Based Health Care, they are struggling with a key issue: lack of trust. How can providers commit to collective cost reductions that could have potentially negative revenue consequences for themselves individually or on their practices? If they don’t believe that the other players or their ACO are operating in the best interests of all involved, how can they participate in the ACO’s goals? Conversely, how can the ACO create effective leadership and collaboration if physicians are unwilling to commit to making the model succeed? Likewise, ACOs have to work harder to earn patients’ trust. Ask…
Read More