Providing Mobile Integrated Healthcare With Payers: Acadian Part Two
Mobile Integrated Healthcare
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Emphasizing Prevention Back On Land
While Safety Management Systems works with patient populations on the Gulf of Mexico, Acadian Health serves large, primarily urban patient populations where prevention is just as critical. This is why Mobile Integrated Health (MIH) has become central to Acadian Health’s approach in managing patients with chronic and urgent care needs.
Acadian Health uses HealthCall in a similar way to offshore medicine, but has direct access to these patients. Acadian Ambulance is accredited by the Commission on Accreditation of Ambulance Services and Commission on Accreditation of Medical Transport Systems and is one of the few services in the nation to achieve both accreditations.
Acadian Health uses HealthCall in a similar way to offshore medicine, but has direct access to these patients. Acadian Ambulance is accredited by the Commission on Accreditation of Ambulance Services and Commission on Accreditation of Medical Transport Systems and is one of the few services in the nation to achieve both accreditations.
Acadian Health paramedics visit patients’ homes for one of two reasons: to manage a crisis or to educate patients on how to avoid a crisis. HealthCall’s platform supports Acadian’s Mobile Integrated Health medics in conducting virtual primary and urgent care visits, conducting screenings for preventive health, assessing social determinants of health (SDOH) such as family support, resources, and access, as well as identifying environmental health risk factors, such as asthma triggers in the home.
Among Acadian Health’s multiple goals is the widely known Triple Aim that grew out of Accountable Care: improve patient experience; improve population health, and concurrently reduce costs. Acadian Health works directly with private payers to minimize the need for emergency room services and help patients take better care of themselves in their own homes. Patients with histories of being frequent users of 911 range from those with Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) to Type 2 Diabetes to those living with Congestive Heart Failure to kids with asthma to the elderly who might be at risk for falls.
“What’s great about HealthCall is that we are able to customize it exactly as we need, which was different from the single-use electronic incident records we had before”
“What’s great about HealthCall is that we are able to customize it exactly as we need, which was different from the single-use electronic incident records we had before,” said Richard Belle, Operations Director at Acadian Health. “It’s that longitudinal view. We help high utilizers, facilitate medication reconciliation, and we are able to build these specific types of assessments into the patients’ electronic medical records, as well as any types of education- based visits we have with patients, such as checking with asthma patients to see if they even have an inhaler and if they do have one, it’s the right kind of inhaler.”
Acadian Health is in constant communication with the patients’ providers, with providers virtually attending home visits to make a recommendation on whether a patient can be managed at home or requires transport to the hospital. Acadian Health works directly with provider groups for reimbursement, following a predetermined, negotiated rate. The company can also bill patients’ insurance companies directly, but frequently work with provider groups paid by insurance companies to manage a patient population.
“If they do a transport,” Belle said, “Acadian makes sure they’re being taken somewhere in- network. It’s not the same as a traditional ambulance service. No bright lights in the street, so the patients maintain some privacy if a transport happens. The patient’s doctor never loses control of how the patient is managed, ninety-eight percent of the time, the patients are cared for at home, and quite frankly, patients see that there’s someone there for them.”
“One of the best features of using the HealthCall platform is providing more robust reporting”, said Belle, “which leads to better care all around. We’ve become an extension of the physician in the patient’s home,” said Belle, “and it allows us to accomplish all three pillars of the Triple Aim. And I think the patients really like it.”
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