By Kathryn Stambaugh
Geriatric Services Director
Clinicians and staff at LifeLong provide highly personalized care, social services, food resources, home visits, and more – all of which reduce demand and costs incurred by the larger healthcare system. Finally, LifeLong has an opportunity to share in those monetary savings through our new participation in an Accountable Care Organization (ACO).
This January, LifeLong and our sister CHCN health centers entered into a new type of Medicare contract by joining an ACO called Community Care Cooperative (C3). Joining this ACO gives LifeLong the potential to receive bonus payments for meeting quality measures and controlling healthcare costs. (Joining the ACO does not change any benefits for patients).
In the next week, C3 will send a flyer about the ACO to our patients with traditional Medicare (not Brown & Toland or other Medicare Advantage plans). This flyer will also be posted at our sites. If a patient asks about it, please explain that LifeLong has a new contract with Medicare, and it will not impact their coverage or services at all.
Joining an ACO is an exciting opportunity for LifeLong. However, for a real chance at bonus payments, we have to improve the accuracy of our Medicare risk scores, which currently suggest that LifeLong patients have lower risk profiles than Medicare patients on average (not true, but also not surprising since we’ve never had to deal with risk scores before). If you want to learn more about how risk is assessed, check out this 30-minute webinar for great tips on improving risk score accuracy.
More to come as we dive into this new world of value-based care!
