Decision Support

The company, founded by former National Coordinator for Health IT Dr. Farzad Mostashari, says advanced analytics are helping its accountable care organizations drive big efficiencies.

Francisco Partners says it will be able to give resources to help the developer of laboratory information systems and point-of-care testing technology innovate its product offerings.

Analytics solutions have been very effective toward improving clinical, financial and operational performance at healthcare organizations, according to a HIMSS Analytics and Dimensional Insight study of 109 senior healthcare executives. WHY IT MATTERS The survey found nearly 85 percent of organizations that are leveraging analytics are doing so in multiple areas, with two-thirds leveraging analytics in all three areas spotlighted by the survey – financial, operational and clinical. Organizations have the highest overall success rate (78 percent) with clinical metrics, with a particular focus on using analytics to reduce readmission rates, infection control and reduction, and patient outcome improvements. Analytics is seen as an extremely important component to organizations' future strategy, with operational efficiency and cost management ranking as the top reasons for implementing analytics across all three areas. Most organizations surveyed said their primary method to determine ROI is financial returns and improvements, followed by clinical outcome improvement and staff efficiency. Survey results, however, indicated that these organizations observe their highest measured success rate (75 percent) if they use clinical outcomes improvement as their primary metric. THE LARGER TREND Budgeting and forecasting is the most employed metric across all three areas, used by roughly 90 percent of all survey respondents, followed closely by financial performance tracking and reporting, financial benchmarking and trending, and revenue cycle management measured success rates were also highest in these areas. When implementing and leveraging an analytics solution at their health system, survey respondents said improvement to patient care (safety, quality and outcomes) was their primary goal in deploying clinical analytics solutions. For financial analytics, increasing revenue and cost management were top concerns, followed by operational efficiency, and for operational analytics, driving efficiency and improving decision-making capabilities was the goal most often cited by respondents, followed by increased revenue and cost management. ON THE RECORD "As healthcare organizations move to value-based payment models, they are finding that focusing on clinical metrics, including readmission rates, infection control, and patient outcome improvements is critical for success," George Dealy, Dimensional Insight's vice president of healthcare solutions, said in a statement. "Analytics provides tremendous insight into these areas and can benefit healthcare organizations that are navigating this transition." "Healthcare analytics has often focused on measuring financial improvement or staff efficiency. And while those are certainly important focus areas for hospitals and health systems, clinical outcomes improvement is critical, especially as value-based payment models take hold," the report concluded. "Those organizations that are focusing on clinical outcomes improvement as their key measurement for ROI report seeing the greatest measured success from their analytics implementations." Nathan Eddy is a healthcare and technology freelancer based in Berlin. Email the writer: nathaneddy@gmail.com Twitter: @dropdeaded209

OMNY Health co-founder and COO Sunny Grewal, whose 3.5-minute elevator pitch was the audience's top pick at the "Shark Tank"-like competition, explains how his distributed ledger tech can help hospitals monetize mounds of unused data.

The clinical pathways system is designed to help make appropriate decisions related to specific clinical questions. The drug tool is designed to help pharmacists, physicians and nurses with access to point-of-care drug information.

The platform, Critical Care Suite, developed in partnership with UC San Francisco and powered by GE's Edison AI technology, can help radiologists prioritize cases involving collapsed lungs.

Four precision medicine experts – a groundbreaking provider organization and three precision medicine technology vendors – offer healthcare CIOs and other leaders their expertise for getting started with the nascent area of medicine.

Mayo Clinic Healthcare in partnership with Oxford University Clinic will use Cerner technology to help enable more proactive health management, more coordinated care and better health outcomes.

For much of the history of modern medicine, the model has been that patients go to the hospital or physician to receive treatment. This works well when all of the tools needed to solve a health problem are concentrated in one location. There are some things that an MRI machine or a ward of specialists can't fix though. Food insecurity, lack of reliable transportation, even levels of literacy and education are all factors that can lead to the types of hospital visits that quickly become expensive. Addressing these upstream factors, known as social determinants of health, requires healthcare systems to look outside of their traditional realms and roles. Cindy Gaines, RN, chief nursing officer at Philips Population Health Management, says that a hospital can't solve every problem in the world but it can broaden what it looks at and whom it works with. Data to target, not overwhelm Hospitals need to know what the needs of their population are before they can start finding ways to address them. Gaines says that a community health assessment is an important place to start, followed by other publicly available health data. While trying to address social factors without targeting the needs of specific populations won't get very far, neither will overloading with data. Start with what you have is her advice. "SDoH surveys can be really long and overwhelmed with data," she says. "Even using ZIP code data, you can learn a lot about a community." Seek out partnerships "We take action one patient at a time when we're in the office," says Gaines, who says practitioners might interact with patients who need to make a choice between paying their electricity or their medical bill – and never know. Instead, hospitals need to partner with organizations that fall outside of the healthcare realm. Gaines says she's seen hospitals partner with or even create farmer's markets or food pantries in food deserts. She notes one health provider sponsored a public bike program in one town to address things like obesity and low exercise rates. Making an impact on SDOH means "really being creative about what we want to do" and then finding the right places in the community to partner with or support, says Gaines. Better understanding a patient population and identifying upstream solutions place the hospital in the role of the coordinator. Focusing on the goal of keeping communities healthy means that communicating better with other providers and outside organizations will help target and address underserved populations. Knowing where to look for data as well helps healthcare providers start to develop standards for how to connect those in need with the services that can help them. When better information about patients and situations that impact their health become clear, hospitals can effectively build partnerships and help address environmental factors. Something as simple as identifying patients with transportation needs and providing rides for them to reach an appointment can lead to a huge decrease in spending. "It takes a community to address the social determinants," says Gaines. "It isn't a hospital going out and changing the world on its own." .jumbotron{ background-image: url("https://www.healthcareitnews.com/sites/hitn/files/u2556/SocialDeterminantJumbotron.jpg"); background-size: cover; color: white; } .jumbotron h2{ color: white; } Focus on Social Determinants of Health In September, Healthcare Finance News, Healthcare IT News and MobiHealthNews will take a look at the SDOH and how varied health systems, IT companies, Congress and others are addressing it. Benjamin Harris is a Maine-based freelance writer and former new media producer for HIMSS Media. Twitter: @BenzoHarris.

The mission control, built in collaboration with GE Healthcare, will help the health system manage patient decision support across nine Florida hospitals.