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How Value-Based Purchasing Will Affect Healthcare Suppliers

Posted by Stan Schroeder on Wed, Jun 08, 2011 @11:15 AM

A new program mandated by the federal government is offering opportunities to healthcare suppliers that can tailor their products and services in ways that help hospitals achieve performance benchmarks in categories set by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS).
 
Starting on Oct. 1, 2012, with the beginning of the 2013 fiscal year, Medicare hospitals and healthcare providers will be required to have in place value-based purchasing (VBP) programs, which will tie a portion of their Medicare payments to performance on measures related to certain conditions, such as heart attacks, heart failure and pneumonia – to name a few. Eventually, other parameters will be added to incorporate "efficiency measures, including measures of 'Medicare spending per beneficiary,'" adjusted for adjusted for age, sex, race, severity of illness and other factors.
 
VBP programs are a way for to CMS to encourage – and provide incentives to – healthcare providers to buy products that can demonstrate value by reducing costs and improving patient outcomes in areas CMS has identified for improvement. Suppliers that can develop and market products and services that meet this need can move ahead of competitors and capture larger shares of the market.
Essential Healthcare Management’s team of experts can help. They work with companies to specifically target products to Medicare hospitals and healthcare providers by devising sales and marketing strategies and by connecting them with key purchasing decision-makers.
 
To learn more, contact us.

Tags: medical, hospitals, healthcare suppliers, Healthcare Service Provider, Quality, CMS, Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services, Value-Based Purchasing, Medicare, VBP, patient satisfaction, business growth

How Will Value-Based Purchasing Affect Hospitals and Healthcare Providers?

Posted by Stan Schroeder on Fri, Jun 03, 2011 @11:53 AM

The Affordable Care Act requires Medicare hospitals and healthcare providers to have in place value-based purchasing (VBP) programs by the beginning of the 2013 fiscal year, which starts Oct. 1, 2012. The initiative is a means of encouraging providers to demonstrate “value” by reducing costs and improving patient outcomes in areas that the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) have identified for improvement.
 
Inpatient acute-care hospitals that meet or exceed certain performance standards for a minimum of five measures related to the care of patients will be eligible for incentive payments, or higher Medicare payments. Initially, the program will cover the following conditions or procedures – acute myocardial infarction (heart attack), heart failure, pneumonia, certain surgeries and healthcare-associated infections. Within a year of launch, the program will expand to include “efficiency measures” that have been adjusted for age, sex, race, severity of illness, etc.
 
The value-based purchasing program initially places one percent of hospitals’ Medicare inpatient prospective payment system payments but increases this to two percent by the 2017 fiscal year. The program marks the first time hospitals will be paid for inpatient acute care services based on care quality and not just the quantity of services provided. According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, it will impact more than 3,500 hospitals across the nation. It is expected that in Fiscal Year 2013, an estimated $850 million will be allocated to hospitals based on their overall performance on a set of VBP quality measures that have been shown to improve clinical processes of care and patient satisfaction.
 
Next week: How Value-Based Purchasing Will Affect Healthcare Suppliers

Tags: healthcare, medical, hospitals, Healthcare Service Provider, Quality, Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services, Value-Based Purchasing, Medicare, Affordable Care Act, VBP, patient satisfaction, business growth

The Virtues of the Outsourcing Model, Part 4: Examining Culture

Posted by Stan Schroeder on Wed, May 11, 2011 @10:11 AM

In our final installment on the virtues of the outsourcing model, we examine the third factor you should consider when evaluating whether outsourcing could improve the productivity and financial climate of your company. Robert Ryan’s position paper on the topic of outsourcing posited that restructuring how companies utilize their human capital, or, in other words, their workforce in-house and elsewhere, will affect how profitable they will be in the future. Ryan suggests that by increasing a company’s agility, or the speed at which they are able to adapt, it will be more likely to weather the many changes to come in the business world.

We have already examined how capacity and capability can affect a company’s decision to outsource. Culture ranks as the third factor that should be considered before making the leap to outsourcing. As Ryan asks, “Do the current organizational norms and values support the development and implementation of the strategy?”

While culture can also refer to the acceptability of this practice in a certain office, it also relates to the acceptability of outsourcing in a particular industry. Ryan points to technology as an industry particularly well-suited to outsourcing. “Competition for specialized technological expertise is found on the world market,” he writes. “With the rise of efficient collaboration capabilities, services can be found in many emerging countries of the world…. Because of technology improvements, work groups can all be brought into our living rooms.”

The health care industry also offers a culture that allows for ad hoc collaboration to fill any gaps in capacity and capability that may exist in one company. Here at EHM we not only serve as the link to connecting health care suppliers with the group purchasing organizations (GPOs), accountable care organizations (ACOs) and integrated delivery networks (IDNs), but we can also handle all of your marketing, advertising and selling needs for you. If you need help determining if these options are right for you, contact us, and we can talk you through the entire process and answer any questions that you have.

Tags: Essential Healthcare Management, Schroeder, Ripullo, marketing, EHM, healthcare, hospitals, ACO, Accountable Care Organizations, healthcare suppliers, HHS, Regulations on ACOs, ACO Regulations, ACOs and suppliers, HHS Regulations, gpos, outsourcing model, IDNs, integrated delivery networks, patient satisfaction

Patient Satisfaction

Posted by Stan Schroeder on Wed, Apr 06, 2011 @02:43 PM

TruthPoint Helps Hospitals Improve Patient Satisfaction Scores

EHM prides itself on connecting valuable medical industry suppliers with those who have purchasing power. Our latest client that we are positioning for success is TruthPoint, which offers an innovative method of helping hospitals dramatically improve their patient experience scores. With this technology in place, TruthPoint can greatly assist Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs) with meeting their own goals when it comes to patient satisfaction.

ACOs will likely become the predominant option for integrating healthcare services for Medicare recipients beginning in January 2012, and EHM aims to ease the way for medical industry suppliers to align their missions to this new system. As the number of registered ACOs continues to skyrocket, EHM is focusing on helping its clients become as marketable as possible to these new organizations and their potential purchasing power. One of the primary ways this can be achieved is by helping clients create services that will appeal across a broad range of healthcare spectrums.

Having accurate and easy-to-procure patient experience scores can eliminate a large burden from hospitals. By relying on TruthPoint, healthcare providers will be able to spend less time obtaining their own figures and more time using the figures from TruthPoint to strategize on how best to serve their patients and strengthen their financial results. TruthPoint’s system is so easy for patients to use that hospitals can implement it at every point of care throughout their system to get a wide-ranging array of results.

For more information on TruthPoint or EHM, please contact EHM.

Tags: Essential Healthcare Management, Schroeder, Ripullo, EHM, healthcare, medical, ACO, Accountable Care Organizations, healthcare suppliers, patient satisfaction, truthpoint

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