Most collected data serves MU attestation (i.e. proving we’re using our EHR systems) or the most common measures for reimbursement or government/payer requirements. But now we need to retool and optimize these EHR systems and processes we’ve McGuyvered to actually practice the best medicine. What does it take to optimize our EHR technology to drive better patient outcomes? Today I talk to Max Stroud from Galen Healthcare Solutions.

It’s hard to work alone to achieve better healthcare outcomes. First of all, unless you have a benchmark, a comparator, it’s really hard to say whether your outcomes are good, better or best. And it’s equally hard to evaluate the efficacy of the process by which you achieved those outcomes. Are you getting the most possible for the resources you expended? Academy Health is a membership organization that helps healthcare stakeholders find the evidence needed, or analyze evidence already located, in the name of better healthcare outcomes.

At the beginning of last year, 2015, many providers started a journey through the four stages of CCM acceptance. The first quarter was Disbelief – are you trying to get me to defraud Medicare? The second quarter was Shangri-La – It’s free money and I can do it myself. The third quarter was Anger – I can’t believe all these regulations, this is never going to work. And the fourth stage was Reality – Oh, you can do all this for me, I can profit at some percentage. Jamie Grant from CareSync and I talk about CCM today.

A group of major patient advocacy groups have joined forces to form the Partners for Better Care Coalition. Their mission is to seek, from the patient point of view, fair affordable and equitable healthcare reform. I speak with Mary Richards about what the group is up to and their broad plans to help transform the system into one that is much friendlier and understandable to the patient.

Andrey Ostrovsky, CEO of Care At Hand, weighs in on quality measures vs. adding CPT codes, aging in place, and predictive analytics.