This article is more than 5 years old. Information may no longer be current.
Practice transformation is process improvement, workflow changes
Click Here to Manage Email Alerts
ORLANDO, Fla. — As nephrologists are being asked to deliver care with direct face-to-face encounters and increasingly as population health managers, it is necessary to have the framework for moving forward with practice transformation, according to a speaker here at the Renal Physicians Association Annual Meeting.
“The role between those two functions overlaps, and it is not exactly clear what the line is, and it is going to vary from practice to practice. But, nevertheless, they are two critical roles that are essential for where we are going in value-based care. How we accomplish those two roles is through tools and functions of those tools that ultimately deliver data that we need to understand population health and other aspects of care,” Adam Weinstein, MD, vice president of medical affairs and clinical IT services for DaVita and chair of RPA Clinical Data Registry Work Group, said.
He said nephrologists have electronic health records, which blend, based on features, into care management platforms. The care management platforms then blend into features of qualified clinical data registries, which ultimately blend into the rating ranking and public reporting tools that nephrologists are held accountable.
“Each of these tools delivers certain levels of the data we are need as we go down the path of transforming into population health managers,” he said.
Weinstein said single patient data review and collection is a function of the EHR, and group data review and collection is mostly a function of care management platforms. Provider and group performance against benchmark standards is a function of registries.
“When you start adding cost or payment data to the clinical data and you start to talk about value, and that is where many of the reimbursement programs are trending,” he said.
He said that as nephrologists migrate practices from direct patient to value-based care, they need to have the right puzzle pieces – people, tools, processes and outcomes. Their pieces need to be specific for the individual nephrologist and practice.
“These puzzle pieces are different shapes and sizes depending on your practice and it is going to be different depending on what you are trying to accomplish but, nevertheless, you need all four of these things to make this work,” he said.
He said the first step is to start at the end and determine what one is trying to accomplish. The second step is to know what data need to be “mined” and from where the data originate. The right people in the right roles, including physicians, advanced practitioners, “data wranglers” and care coordinators, are essential. Nephrologists also need to manage the project from start to finish and manage the challenges of human resources (HR) and staffing issues.
Weinstein said practice transformation can expand the cost of doing business and the revenue side of a practice may be offset. He said to plan early for practice transformation.
“Practice transformation is institutionalized data management combined with HR and workflow changes. Practice transformation is ultimately about process improvement. While it feels comfortable to take small steps, there is some minimal amount [of] change that needs to happen to participate,” he said. – by Kristine Houck, MA, ELS
Reference:
Weinstein A. Preparing for practice transformation. Presented at: Renal Physicians Association Annual Meeting; March 15-18, 2018; Orlando, Fla.
Disclosure: Weinstein reports he is an employee of DaVita Inc. and has various roles for the Renal Physicians Association.