Streamlining and Reimagining Prior Authorization Under Value-Based Contracts: A Call to Action From the Value in Healthcare Initiative's Prior Authorization Learning Collaborative.

Utilization management strategies, including prior authorization, are commonly used to facilitate safe and guideline-adherent provision of new, individualized, and potentially costly cardiovascular therapies. However, as currently deployed, these approaches encumber multiple stakeholders. Patients are discouraged by barriers to appropriate access; clinicians are frustrated by the time, money, and resources required for prior authorizations, the frequent rejections, and the perception of being excluded from the decision-making process; and payers are weary of the intensive effort to design and administer increasingly complex prior authorization systems to balance value and appropriate use of these treatments. These issues highlight an opportunity to collectively reimagine utilization management as a transparent and collaborative system. This would benefit the entire healthcare ecosystem, especially in light of the shift to value-based payment. This article describes the efforts and vision of the multistakeholder Prior Authorization Learning Collaborative of the Value in Healthcare Initiative, a partnership between the American Heart Association and the Robert J. Margolis, MD, Center for Health Policy at Duke University. We outline how healthcare organizations can take greater utilization management responsibility under value-based contracting, especially under different state policies and local contexts. Even with reduced payer-mandated prior authorization in these arrangements, payers and healthcare organizations will have a continued shared need for utilization management. We present options for streamlining these programs, such as gold carding and electronic and automated prior authorization processes. Throughout the article, we weave in examples from cardiovascular care when possible. Although reimagining prior authorization requires collective action by all stakeholders, it may significantly reduce administrative burden for clinicians and payers while improving outcomes for patients.

AMCP Partnership Forum: Integrated Delivery Networks' Role in Pharmaceutical Value-Based Agreements.

Health care payment models that reward value over volume have the potential to improve patient care and control rising costs. These payment models are increasingly being implemented by a range of care delivery providers in the United States. Integrated delivery networks (IDNs)-systems of providers and sites (e.g., group practices and hospitals) that care for and provide health care services and health insurance plans to patients in a specific region or market-present special opportunities and challenges for value-based care and represent an important sector for the advancement of value-based models. Successful implementation of value-based agreements in IDNs requires a range of complex capabilities, including advanced data analytics, population health management solutions, comprehensive care management, and successful patient engagement. To address these and other operational issues, the Academy of Managed Care Pharmacy convened a stakeholder forum on November 13-14, 2018, in Baltimore, MD. Forum attendees addressed topics including (a) the current delivery of value-based care in IDNs; (b) opportunities and barriers to implementing pharmaceutical value-based agreements; (c) recommendations for IDNs to reach the full potential of value-based agreements; and (d) opportunities for collaborations among managed care organizations, accountable care organizations, and IDNs to improve health care outcomes. Thought leaders with a wide range of backgrounds attended the forum, including those representing patients, payers, providers, government, and biopharmaceutical companies. The forum was sponsored by Amgen, Boehringer Ingelheim, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Genentech, Lilly, MedImpact, Merck, National Pharmaceutical Council, Novo Nordisk, Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, Takeda, and Xcenda. This proceedings document presents common themes and comments from individual participants at the forum, which are not necessarily endorsed by all attendees, nor should they be construed to reflect group consensus. DISCLOSURES: This AMCP Partnership Forum and the development of this proceedings document were supported by Amgen, Boehringer Ingelheim, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Genentech, Lilly, MedImpact, Merck, National Pharmaceutical Council, Novo Nordisk, Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, Takeda, and Xcenda.

Evolving Changes in the Delivery of Health Services: A Place for Urological Homecare?

The ongoing pressure to improve quality while reducing costs is leading to increased uptake of various urological homecare models. Urological homecare can involve reductions in hospital usage and costs, traveling time for the patient, and hospital deaths and can improve patient experience and satisfaction.

A Primer on Population Health Management and Its Perioperative Application.

The movement toward value-based payment models, driven by governmental policies, federal statutes, and market forces, is propelling the importance of effectively managing the health of populations to the forefront in the United States and other developed countries. However, for many anesthesiologists, population health management is a new or even foreign concept. A primer on population health management and its potential perioperative application is thus presented here. Although it certainly continues to evolve, population health management can be broadly defined as the specific policies, programs, and interventions directed at optimizing population health. The Population Health Alliance has created a particularly cogent conceptual framework and interconnected and very useful population health process model, which together identify the key components of population health and its management. Population health management provides a useful rationale for patients, providers, payers, and policymakers to move collectively away from the traditional system of individual, siloed providers to a more integrated, coordinated, team-based approach, thus creating a holistic view of the patient population. The goal of population health management is to keep the targeted patient population as healthy as possible, thus minimizing the need for costly interventions such as emergency department visits, acute hospitalizations, laboratory testing and imaging, and diagnostic and therapeutic procedures. Population health management strategies are increasingly more important to leaders of health care systems as the health of populations for which they care, especially in a strong cost risk-sharing environment, must be optimized. Most population health management efforts rely on a patient-centric team approach, coordination of care, effective communication, robust outcomes data analysis, and continuous quality improvement. Anesthesiologists have an opportunity to help lead these efforts in concert with their surgical and nursing colleagues. The Triple Aim of Healthcare includes (1) improving the patient experience of care (including quality and satisfaction); (2) improving the health of populations; and (3) reducing per-capita costs of care. The Perioperative Surgical Home essentially seeks to transform perioperative care by achieving the Triple Aim, including improving the health of the surgical population. Many health care delivery systems and many clinicians (including anesthesiologists) are just beginning their population health management journeys. However, by doing so, they are preparing to navigate a much greater risk-sharing landscape, where these efforts can create greater financial stability by preventing major financial loss. Anesthesiologists can and should be leaders in this effort to add value by improving the comprehensive continuum of care of our patients.