By Gregg A. Masters, MPH
In a week when Blue Shield of California served Monarch Healthcare as proxy for Optum aka United HealthGroup a $10.5 million damages demand for arbitration enumerating a number of contractual breaches, the following headline was also in the news (for full article, click here):
Doctors decry Kern Medical Center cut of family medicine [residency] program
Say what? They must be kidding, right? Accountable care, the pursuit of the holy grail ‘triple aim’ and hope from health IT to connect the disconnected and compensate for a silo-ed based sick care eco-system are on everyone’s [with a pulse] radar these days. Certainly health wonks and senior clinical and institutional leadership know primary care is an essential ingredient for any ‘high performing’ health system, and that we face a current shortage as well as imbalance between primary v. specialty care in the US. Yet somehow it makes sense to clamp down on sorely needed primary care capacity?
Fortunately to offer some timely insights as to the role of primary care in accountable care I chatted with thought leader L. Gordon Moore, MD, President of Ideal Medical Practices on Wednesday, March 7th, 2012. We cover some ground from hospital or institutionally led ACOs, to the promise of bundling or outcome based payment to the role of the patient in the ACO.
To listen to the interview, click here.
acowatch.me 