Healthcare Matters

All this talk about the Patient-Centered Medical Home has already given way to the “Patient Centered Medical Neighborhood?” The Center for Medicare & Medicaid Innovation (CMMI) announced Friday that it has awarded a $20.75 million Health Care Innovation Challenge grant to a partnership that includes VHA Inc., the national health care network; TransforMED, a not-for-profit subsidiary of the American Academy of Family Physicians; and, Phytel, Inc., a technology company that leads the field in automated, provider-led population health improvement solutions.

The grant will fund a three-year national project involving health care systems, hospitals, and provider practices throughout 16 communities. The goal of the project is to expand the concept of the Patient-Centered Medical Home to the Patient-Centered Medical Neighborhood and connect acute-care hospitals with primary care, specialty and subspecialty practices to drive better quality and superior patient experience at a more affordable cost.

The Department of Health and Human Services announced late last year that it would provide up to $1 billion in grants to implement the most compelling new ideas to deliver better health, improved care and lower costs to people enrolled in Medicare, Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP), particularly those with the highest health care needs. The project, which will be led by TransforMED, will utilize Phytel’s population health management solutions to automate care gap identification, patient outreach, care management, patient engagement, and performance evaluation.

TransforMED CEO Terry McGeeney, MD, MBA, who will serve as the project’s executive sponsor, said the collaboration is expected to achieve significant improvements in the effectiveness and efficiency of patient care, while driving improved patient outcomes. “Through this project, we will take a unique approach of linking developing medical home techniques and patient population management metrics across varied communities that in aggregate represent a strategic cross-section of the nation,” Dr. McGeeney explained. “We expect that our results from this project will be replicable in any community.”

Steve Schelhammer, CEO of Phytel, commented, “Phytel, VHA, and TransforMED will work together and in partnership with the 16 health care provider organizations across the country to advance care delivery approaches consistent with the patient-centered medical home model designed to deliver high quality care at a lower cost. At the same time, we expect that our automation tools will enable the participating organizations to scale up quickly for population health management so that all their patients receive appropriate care and are fully engaged in disease and illness prevention.”

Health care organizations participating in the project include:

• Allegiance Health, Jackson, Mich.
• Avera St. Anthony’s Hospital, O’Neill, Neb.
• Charleston Area Medical Center, Charleston, W.Va.
• Columbus Regional, Columbus, Ind.
• Elmhurst Clinic, Elmhurst, Ill.
• Gundersen Lutheran, La Crosse, Wis.
• Huntsville Hospital, Huntsville, Ala.
• INTEGRIS Health, Oklahoma City, Okla.
• Marquette General Health, Marquette, Mich.
• Northeast Georgia Health System, Gainesville, Ga.
• North Mississippi Health Services, Tupelo, Miss.
• North Shore Physicians Group, Salem, Mass.
• Orlando Health, Orlando, Fla.
• Owensboro Medical Health System, Owensboro, Ky.
• Via Christi Health, Wichita, Kan.
• Western Connecticut Health Network, Danbury, Conn.

Said Byron Jobe, VHA executive vice president, service and delivery, “The Health Care Innovation Challenge represents another important and historic move by CMS to achieve the critical health care ‘triple aim’ — better health, better health care, and lower costs. We believe that our collaboration with TransforMED and Phytel will deliver exciting and impressive results, which we will look forward to sharing as we proceed.”

Source: MarketWatch

The project costs $20.75 million and is expected to generate about $53 million in savings, measured over a three-year period. If that number causes you a bit of a twitch, keep in mind that the scale of the project limits the projected ROI.

—Tom Finn