Building a Solid Foundation for Value-Based Care

By Jon Wells, vice president of marketing, Midmark Corp. August 27, 2018

Is your outpatient facility fully prepared to achieve performance goals tied to emerging value-based payment models?

If you’re like many healthcare professionals, your answer is either a hesitant “yes” or a slightly panicked “I think…maybe…I’m not sure.” If you’d like to be more confident with your answer, you may need to make a few changes in your point of care ecosystem.

Many healthcare organizations are realizing that a more connected point of care ecosystem better prepares organizations to succeed in the new value-based payment world.

The importance of a connected point of care ecosystem in ambulatory care cannot be overstated. It is an invaluable strategic approach for improving clinical outcomes. It helps knock down silos by integrating processes, equipment and caregivers to enhance patient and caregiver experiences and improve the quality of care. It also provides a platform for leveraging new technologies, incorporating best practices, and employing greater standardization.

The patient-centered approach fostered by a connected ecosystem helps your organization transition to a value-based reimbursement model in four key areas:

Clinical Outcomes
• Decreases human variables that contribute to inaccurate diagnosis
• Sets the stage for appropriate diagnoses and care planning based on consistent and accurate vital signs acquisition
• Promotes clinical standardization by incorporating established best practices for common office procedures
• Enhances clinical data management among team members

Patient Satisfaction
• Creates seamless, well-coordinated, patient-centered experience
• Optimizes time spent on patient needs by the entire care team
• Instills confidence in clinical data accuracy at the point of care
• Provides access to data for patient education and treatment discussion

Cost of Care
• Establishes platform for introducing best practices to drive more efficient workflows
• Improves performance through data-driven business decisions
• Reduces transcription errors
• Automates key processes, where possible, to gain efficiency and precision

Provider Satisfaction
• Establishes consistent processes and standardization across exam rooms and networks
• Allows more quality time spent with patients
• Improves workflows that help care teams work more closely together
• Strengthens disease management through confidence in data accuracy  

A connected point of care ecosystem does not guarantee higher Merit-Based Incentive Payment System (MIPS) scores or better reimbursements. However, leveraging the connected ecosystem will enable you to meet some of the quality metrics the model uses as part of its calculation.

Remember, your ambulatory environment is the centerpiece of any effective value-based care strategy. A fully connected point of care ecosystem provides a solid foundation to help you and your team with the fundamentals of effective patient encounters and quality care.