December 2015

Mohammad Anas Wahaj | 09 dec 2015

U.S. spends a total of US$ 2.8 trillion on healthcare and surprisingly about half of it is spent on just 5% of the general population. To expand healthcare reach the general solution is to spend more money. But Prof. David S. Buck of Baylor College of Medicine and director of the Primary Care Innovation Center (PCIC) in Houston (Texas, US), explains that spending more money, specifically in Harris County, has yielded poor outcomes, no coordination between healthcare providers and no safety net system for those most in need. According to him the healthcare system is non-existent in the region and it is merely a grouping of medical silos. The nonprofit PCIC is working towards creating a true healthcare system to reach the most vulnerable and most medically expensive residents, and provide affordable and better healthcare overall by reducing hospital costs. PCIC is first identifying 'super-utilizers', a small group of patients that are extremely sick and costly. These patients utilize most of the healthcare services and are generally treated in emergency rooms. Health staff after identifying these 'super-utilizers' will work with them individually and develop a treatment and care plan for better management of their health issues. This will finally reduce their hospital emergency visits and lower healthcare costs. Delay in treating small problems leads them to become emergencies and bring inefficiencies in the health system along with increased difficulties to patients. Prof. Buck suggests an integrated database of these patients for timely and effective treatment and care. According to him, 'Developing a safety net takes time, commitment and shared data...If hospitals share data, it won't just improve the institution's bottom line; it'll improve care for the community...We also need school systems to share data, so that we can learn how health and social factors are linked, and improve the health of students and their families.' Read on...

Houston Chronicle: Medical data-sharing could curb cost of 'super-utilizers'
Author: David S. Buck

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