McKesson : How Collaboration Drives Specialty Practice Success

What does it take for specialty practices to succeed in an increasingly complex and competitive health care environment? The answer is collaboration-between clinicians and patients, practices and IT vendors, clinical and financial data, and physicians and staff.

Highlighted from previous blog posts on McKesson.com, five experts offer examples and actionable insights on collaboration in four areas-data analytics, patient engagement, staffing and value-based care-that specialty practices can pursue to drive better clinical and financial outcomes.

Value-Based Care

'By participating in the OCM (Oncology Care Model), oncology practices will get in on the ground floor of value-based reimbursement. Practices will be expected to acquire the competencies and establish the practice infrastructure required to succeed in a new health care environment that rewards them for the value that they deliver to cancer patients. Value in this case is defined as the best possible clinical outcomes at a reduced cost.'

Marcus Neubauer, M.D. | Medical Director of Oncology Services, US Oncology Network and McKesson Specialty Health

'We recommend practices meet with their EHR vendors as soon as possible to learn whether their systems are capable of collecting and reporting the selected performance measures to CMS. If not, the practices will have to work with their EHR vendors to upgrade, modify or optimize their systems to make complying with all MIPS as seamless and efficient as possible.'

Linda Pottinger | Director of Payer Initiatives, Innovative Practice Services, McKesson Specialty Health

Data Analytics

'Data can provide actionable clinical and financial insights, and the marriage of the two through data analytics is powerful. That union can build collaborative relationships between oncology practices and payers over value-based care models. It can also build reciprocal relationships between practices and oncology drug manufacturers over research and clinical trials.'

Randy Hyun | Senior Vice President and General Manager, Provider Solutions, McKesson Specialty Health

'Incorporating information from analytics to improve practice workflow is where we see practices benefit the most. That's the real power of analytics-having the right information at the point of care and using the information to make the best decisions possible. Data and analytics should be more than just tools that create reports physicians read at the end of the week or the month or the quarter.'

Dan Lodder | Vice President and General Manager, Technology Solutions, McKesson Specialty Health

Staffing

'The practice should introduce its advanced practice provider care delivery model with new patients, rather than established patients, as the accepted way of providing care at the practice. Practices may find this method allows for a smoother transition rather than convincing established patients that the new model is as effective as receiving care from an oncologist.'

Gabe Torres | Director of Innovative Practice Services, McKesson Specialty Health

'Once eligible patients are identified, someone at the practice will need to enroll them in the OCM (Oncology Care Model) program. Additionally, someone will need to bill Medicare the PBPM monthly fee and need to serve as the patient navigator. And someone will also have to ensure that the clinical documentation complies with program reporting requirements. All of this will be a major change in responsibilities and workflows for a typical community oncology practice. Everyone is involved in practice transformation. It means training and cross-training office staff, educating and training oncologists and, perhaps, hiring additional staff.'

Marcus Neubauer, M.D. | Medical Director of Oncology Services, US Oncology Network and McKesson Specialty Health

Patient Engagement

'Care teams who introduce the use of a portal to patients as part of their treatment experience can drive increased adoption. When physicians tell patients and their caregivers about the portal, it's as if they're prescribing the portal as they would a medication, and we see that patients and their caregivers are very likely to log-in.'

Dan Lodder | Vice President and General Manager, Technology Solutions, McKesson Specialty Health