Healthcare IT News - January 2008 - (Page 21) www.HealthcareITNews.com PhySIcIaN PRactIcES & aMBulatoRy caRE viders are in primary care, and we’re nearing the cap,” Casmer said. “We ultimately would like to get 70 percent of our network in the P4P program.” Casmer said BCBSM pays for the program by diverting a portion Mark Casmer of the annual fee update and professional fees to an incentive pool. This has proven somewhat con- January 2008 ■ Healthcare IT News 21 IHa underlying capabilities absolutely need to be the focus of healthcare Continued from page 19 improvement.” Approximately what P4P means,” said Ward. “Too 6,000 Michigan many plans incentivize excellence physicians – of rather than improvements. Our 20,000 in the netcustomers have become aware work – currently that specific technologies meet participate in the the test of improvement. E-preprogram, said Mark scribing and chronic disease regRichard Ward Casmer, BCBSM’s istries are essential. These technologies can capture orders, offer manager of provider partnerdecision support and keep track of ships. “Most of the participating prowhat a patient really needs. Those troversial for some physicians, according to Gabard. “This was a loser for a lot of physicians in the state, due to the fee reduction,” said Gabard. “The payers haven’t really figured out a good way to pay for programs like this.” Gabard revealed that IHA receives quality incentives worth millions of dollars per year as a result of participation in the Physician Group Initiative Program, and she said IT is the key. “Information technology made the difference,” Gabard said. “We used our practice management system to identify patients seen within the last two years with specific diagnoses, and to establish disease registries even before launching the EMR. But Carlotta Gabard EMR is the longterm answer.” n More at HealthcareITNews.com e ●Connect: IHa 0108 RemoTe Continued from page 19 Tang said patients would monitor their blood glucose readings at home on a glucometer, which will automatically upload the data to the PAMF electronic health record using wireless technology. The integrated technology was developed by a group of companies, including iMetrikus, Epic Systems, Palm and Sprint. A similar remote monitoring project currently kicking off on the East Coast will be run by the Center for Connected Health, a division of Boston-based Partners Healthcare. CCH is teaming with the Ambulatory Project of the Future program at Massachusetts General Hospital to assess remote monitoring of patients with type 2 diabetes. The CCH project relies on technology created by a coalition similar to that undergirding the PAMF study. Patients affiliated with MGH’s Bullfinch Medical Group will collect and transmit their blood glucose readings through an iMetrikus communications gateway tool, and will key other information – such as mealtimes and exercise – into an online database. “We want to use monitoring and messaging technology to connect patients with their provider network,” said Joseph Kvedar, MD, CCH’s director. “We’ll have nurses analyze the data when it comes in, and then alert a physician if there needs to be a medication change or a new lab test.” Both Kvedar and Tang contend that remote monitoring is the future of chronic care. Yet they acknowledge that there are hurdles to adoption, one of the biggest being reimbursement. “Right now we can’t get reimbursed for this kind of service, but payers should be very interested in this,” Tang said. “We just need to prove that it’s both clinically and cost effective.” “We’re making a big bet as a system that reimbursement is going to change to a quality-based paradigm rather than a transactionbased paradigm,” said Kvedar. “We have ongoing discussions with local payers and with state Medicaid about changes to the system.” n More at HealthcareITNews.com e ● Connect: allSCrIPtS 0108 e ●Connect: reMote 0108 http://www.HealthcareITNews.com http://HealthcareITNews.com http://www.healthcareitnews.com/story.cms?id=8421 http://allscripts.com/red http://allscripts.com/red http://HealthcareITNews.com http://www.healthcareitnews.com/story.cms?id=8419 http://www.healthcareitnews.com/eConnect.cms?id=8469
For optimal viewing of this digital publication, please enable JavaScript and then refresh the page. If you would like to try to load the digital publication without using Flash Player detection, please click here.