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Broad Approach May be Better for Reducing Readmissions, Study Suggests
As the CMS begins the second year of a penalty program for preventable hospital readmissions required by the healthcare reform law, new research indicates that hospitals fare better when they focus on patient care more generally rather than targeting specific conditions, such heart failure, or specific timeframes, such as 30 days post-discharge.
As the CMS begins the second year of a penalty program for preventable hospital readmissions required by the healthcare reform law, new research indicates that hospitals fare better when they focus on patient care more generally rather than targeting specific conditions, such heart failure, or specific timeframes, such as 30 days post-discharge.
According to the study, published in the British Medical Journal, top-performing hospitals had fewer readmissions across the board, regardless of condition. Those findings could have significant implications for hospitals that are concentrating their improvement efforts on particular areas, such as heart failure care, the authors said.
“Our findings suggest that hospitals may best achieve low rates of readmission by employing strategies that lower readmission risk globally rather than for specific diagnoses or time periods after hospitalization,” said Dr. Kumar Dharmarajan, a visiting scholar at the Center for Outcomes Research and Evaluation at Yale, and the study's lead author.
Researchers from the Yale University School of Medicine analyzed three years of Medicare data covering more than 600,000 30-day readmissions for heart failure, heart attack or pneumonia at more than 4,000 hospitals.
Read the full story here: http://bit.ly/If9qmL
Source: Modern Healthcare
Varied Access: The Pharmacogenetic Testing Coverage Divide
February 18th 2025On this episode of Managed Care Cast, we speak with the author of a study published in the February 2025 issue of The American Journal of Managed Care® to uncover significant differences in coverage decisions for pharmacogenetic tests across major US health insurers.
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How Access to SMA Treatment Varies Globally and by Insurance Type
March 18th 2025Posters presented at the 2025 Muscular Dystrophy Association (MDA) Clinical & Scientific Conference show that therapeutic advances in treating spinal muscular atrophy (SMA) are not uniformly making it into the hands of patients who could benefit.
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Value-Based Care Is Key to Bringing Cardiology Breakthroughs to Those Who Will Benefit Most
March 13th 2025On December 10, 2024, cardiologists, researchers, and value-based care experts gathered in Dallas, Texas, to discuss best practices for implementing advances in cardiology care with a value-based mindset, spanning the care continuum from prevention to treatment.
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A Focus on MAHA, Lasting Changes to Health Care Programs for Trump’s Second Term
March 13th 2025The second Trump administration is expected to bring changes to Medicaid, Medicare Advantage, and the health insurance exchanges, as well as highlight the Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) movement, speakers at the Value-Based Insurance Design Summit said.
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