Why Hospital And Surgeon Alignment Is A Must For The Future
marcus evans Summits are high-level business forums for decision-makers to meet, learn, and discuss strategies and solutions. These events provide attendees the opportunity to individually tailor their schedules of keynote presentations, case studies, roundtables, and one-on-one business meetings.
Stuart Morris-Hipkins, SVP & General Manager of Syncera, a solution provider company attending marcus evans National Healthcare CXO Summit Fall 2016, took time to discuss how hospital and surgeon alignment can positively impact patient care and the cost of care.
“With healthcare reimbursement changes like CMS’ new Episode Payment Models, it will become absolutely critical that all parties are aligned and working well together,” said Morris-Hipkins. “Hospitals have to revisit the entire episode of care, to ensure patients continue to have the best care and outcomes, regardless of surgery or surgeon.”
Q: How can hospital and surgeon alignment improve?
Morris-Hipkins: Alignment is about ensuring the hospital and the surgeons are working together in a much more collaborative manner, and looking at different metrics to improve patient outcomes and efficiency. It could be OR efficiency, patient reported outcomes or patient satisfaction scores. The values should be appropriate and shared appropriately, based on a set of clear criteria, and in place for the duration of the bundle. Everyone must work well together. Alignment across the entire episode, from both the service providers and the surgeons, will be critical in this new world of fixed reimbursement for different procedures.
Having good and critical metrics around quality and outcomes, and incentives that are aligned with protocols, will deliver the best care for patients.
How should physicians and surgeons interact with hospitals with respect to bundled payment?
Morris-Hipkins: It depends on how the physicians structure themselves, how many surgeon groups are in place, and so on. Essentially, every hospital and surgeon group needs to work together, explore all the options that make sense for them. There are both federal and state guidelines to meet. To understand the rules of engagement are as important as the structure and what the desired outcome of the agreement will be.
You need to understand all the options available to ensure each hospital and surgeon group has the right information to make the best informed choices. Hospitals and surgeons have a variety of choices, from co-management agreements to gain sharing agreements. It is obviously important to work with an experienced legal expert as well. To get everyone aligned, the right conversations should occur and people must understand what it takes to be successful.
How can hospitals ensure the best outcome for each patient?
Morris-Hipkins: It’s about understanding the different types of patients coming in for surgery and what their needs are. It is absolutely critical to get the best outcome, to educate the patient, have the appropriate service and support throughout the entire episode. Surgeons have to ensure those protocols remain throughout the episode, that the hospital supports the patient. Tomorrow is about the patient having a good experience throughout the episode of care from the hospital setting through post-acute.
Any final words of advice?
Morris-Hipkins: Understand the changes that are occurring and that you cannot wait for the market to change. Having a holistic view from the pre-operative, inter-operative and post-operative care for any specialty is critical. It is the CEO’s, hospital’s and surgeon’s role to now orchestrate that across the entire episode in a way that meets the new landscape. Get organized and stay informed, consider alignment agreements, put case navigators in place and partner with the right vendors.
About The National Healthcare CXO Summit Fall 2016
The 15th National Healthcare CXO Summit will bring together senior level healthcare executives and solution providers. The Summit offers an intimate environment for a focused discussion of key new drivers shaping the healthcare industry. Taking place at The Ritz-Carlton, Marina del Rey, Los Angeles, October 16-18, 2016, the Summit includes presentations on healthcare reform and the ACA, managing population health, achieving operational excellence, driving innovation, and focusing on the patient experience.
For more information about this event please visit: http://events.marcusevans-events.com/national-healthcare-cxo-summit-october16-healthitoutcomes/. Please note that the Summit is a closed business event and the number of participants strictly limited.