Advisory Board's Dennis Weaver Shares Real-World Experience in Value-Based Care Success

WASHINGTON, May 10, 2017

Dr. Weaver, Chief Medical Officer and National Partner at Advisory Board, shared his insights on how to thrive under these emerging care models at WHCC's Hospital and Health System Summit in Washington, DC.  During the presentation, Pragmatic Approaches to Succeed at Value-Based Payment and Care, he said that hospitals and health systems are shaking up their care models in the face of pressure to lower their costs of providing care regardless of the fate of the Affordable Care Act.

Specifically, providers should invest in the development of more robust risk-stratification tools that incorporate non-clinical risk factors, Dr. Weaver said. Historically, providers have not systematically evaluated how often and how deeply patients' health is affected by social barriers, such as transportation, housing, and environmental issues. The most successful provider organizations adopt the updated risk-stratification process and then develop unique care models to address the needs of the patients identified by the process.

With better understanding of community health needs, health systems can secure their future success in the new care models by building more effective care network assets (such as new care sites and community partnerships) and care management teams, Dr. Weaver said. These teams, when deployed effectively, create structures to proactively help patients better manage their own health and avoid unnecessary hospitalizations. This impactful level of patient engagement often requires health systems to partner with community organizations to remove barriers to accessing holistic care.

Fellow panelists at the WHCC session were moderator Jill Brown, Executive Editor at AISHealth; Paul N. Casale, MD, MPH, a cardiologist and Executive Director of NewYork Quality Care, the ACO of NewYork-Presbyterian, Weill Cornell Medicine, and Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons; and John Bulger, DO, Chief Medical Officer, Population Health at Geisinger Health System and Chief Medical Officer at Geisinger Health Plan. WHCC brought together more than 1,200 executives, experts, and administrators from Fortune 500 companies, insurers, hospitals, and pharmaceutical and biotech companies.

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Advisory Board is a best practices firm that uses a combination of research, technology, and consulting to improve the performance of 4,500+ health care organizations. As the health care business of The Advisory Board Company (NASDAQ: ABCO), Advisory Board forges and finds the best new ideas and proven practices from its network of thousands of leaders, then customizes and hardwires them into every level of member organizations, creating enduring value. For more information, visit www.advisory.com.