Bellin Health Partners, UnitedHealthcare Launch Accountable Care Program
• Accountable care collaboration to enhance how the health system cares for patients
• More resources committed to sharing information and coordinating patient care
Bellin Health Partners and UnitedHealthcare have launched an accountable care program to help improve people’s health and their satisfaction with their health care experience.
The new accountable care program dedicates more resources to care coordination and makes it easier to share important health information. Bellin Health Partners member hospitals, clinics and physicians will share in the savings generated through providing care under a value-based, patient-centric care model focused on keeping people healthy.
All Wisconsin residents enrolled in UnitedHealthcare’s employer-sponsored health plans are eligible to benefit from this collaboration, which began July 1. More than 20,000 UnitedHealthcare employer-sponsored plan participants access Bellin Health’s services each year.
Bellin Health Partners’ accountable care organization (ACO) is affiliated with Bellin Health, a regional not-for-profit health system offering a complete array of primary and specialty medical care including primary care, behavioral health, cardiology, cardiac surgery and orthopedics. The ACO includes more than 250 primary care physicians, specialty physicians and advanced care practitioners working together to coordinate all phases of patient care.
“Our organization is designed to generate healthcare savings through greater coordination, while improving patient access to care and convenience,” said Naomi Wedin, Bellin Health Partners executive director. “By partnering with UnitedHealthcare, our organizations can deliver a far more efficient experience to patients with improved results, leading to greater overall health.”
Many people who have gone to the doctor or hospital – particularly those with complex or chronic illnesses – have found they often have to connect information from each doctor visit themselves, and have sometimes received duplicative tests or care that isn’t coordinated.
Through this collaboration, UnitedHealthcare and Bellin Health Partners will work together to better coordinate patients’ care, using shared technology, timely data and information about emergency room visits and hospital admissions. This partnership will also provide services to help patients manage their chronic health conditions by enhancing relationships with their personal physicians and encouraging healthy lifestyles.
“UnitedHealthcare and Bellin Health Partners are working together to help people receive more personalized and better connected care, which will significantly enhance people’s ability to live healthier lives,” said Dustin Hinton, president and CEO, UnitedHealthcare of Wisconsin.
UnitedHealthcare will supplement Bellin Health Partners’ data to help support overall population health, giving the entire care team clear, actionable data about individual patients’ health needs, potential gaps in care and proactive identification of high-risk patients. Patient navigators may be used to support community-based care coordination, such as helping with planning after a patient is discharged from the hospital and scheduling follow-up appointments.
UnitedHealthcare serves more than 1.5 million residents in Wisconsin with a network of 150 hospitals and more than 28,000 physicians and other care providers statewide.
More than 14 million people enrolled in UnitedHealthcare plans across the country have access to accountable care programs, delivered in part through more than 750 accountable care arrangements nationwide as the organization engages in deeper, more collaborative relationships with physicians and hospitals.
Care providers nationwide are showing strong interest in a shift to value-based care. UnitedHealthcare’s total payments to physicians and hospitals that are tied to value-based arrangements have tripled in the last three years to more than $48 billion. By the end of 2018, UnitedHealthcare expects that figure to reach $65 billion.
For more information about UnitedHealthcare’s full spectrum of value-based initiatives, visit www.UHC.com/valuebasedcare.
About Bellin Health Partners
Bellin Health Partners ACO is an accountable care organization affiliated with Bellin Health that includes more than 250 primary care and specialty physicians, along with advanced care practitioners, working together to coordinate all phases of patient care. Services are conveniently provided at over 40 locations throughout Northeast Wisconsin and the Upper Peninsula of Michigan and are designed to provide care at the appropriate level and convenience for each individual. Bellin Health Partners is a participant in the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services’ Next Generation Accountable Care Organization Model.
About UnitedHealthcare
UnitedHealthcare is dedicated to helping people nationwide live healthier lives by simplifying the health care experience, meeting consumer health and wellness needs, and sustaining trusted relationships with care providers. The company offers the full spectrum of health benefit programs for individuals, employers, military service members, retirees and their families, and Medicare and Medicaid beneficiaries, and contracts directly with more than 1 million physicians and care professionals, and 6,000 hospitals and other care facilities nationwide. UnitedHealthcare is one of the businesses of UnitedHealth Group (NYSE: UNH), a diversified Fortune 50 health and well-being company. For more information, visit UnitedHealthcare at www.uhc.com or follow @myUHC on Twitter.