CEO Dr. Cosgrove Talks Accountable Healthcare and Unicorns with Global Partners
Posted on Thu, Jan 05, 2012 @ 11:50 AM
Accountability is a key requirement for all organizations. However, healthcare companies and hospitals are more accountable than other industries because they have to improve not only revenue and profitability but patient outcomes as well. For nearly 20 years, Global Partners has worked with leading companies in healthcare and have experienced this challenge first hand.
This combined focus on business, operational and patient results has led to a new kind of healthcare model called Accountable Care Organizations (ACO), a type of payment and delivery reform that seeks to tie provider reimbursements to quality metrics and reductions in the total cost of care for an assigned population of patients.
ACO represents a unique opportunity for the healthcare providers and government to work in collaboration. In our third interview with Dr. Cosgrove, CEO of the Cleveland Clinic, we talk about how the Cleveland Clinic, a multispecialty academic medical center and one of the leading healthcare institutions in the world, sees ACO’s and their future in healthcare.
GLOBAL PARTNERS: We’re curious about your view of ACO developments, the viability of ACO’s and what the impact might be on the Cleveland Clinic and technology?
DR. COSGROVE: Are you talking about the Unicorn?
GLOBAL PARTNERS: You mean they may exist but I’ll believe it when I see it.
DR. COSGROVE: That’s right. The first iteration of ACO came from the government. It was modeled on a risk reward ratio. It was totally untenable. No one stood up and saluted it. There were a lot of comments back. After that, it took two years for the government to write what the definition of an ACO was. I don’t think they could change the payment system in the next two years, so that all of a sudden it happens every place. So I think we’re going to be sort of like we are with the electronic medical record. We’re sort of half way into electronic and half way still on paper. So I think the question really is timing and how you plan for an organization like this, how fast that you rollout something like an ACO.
GLOBAL PARTNERS: What will advance the ACO model?
DR. COSGROVE: What we’re really talking about is paying for healthcare in a different way then we have previously. And if that’s going to happen, 50% of that pay is going to have to come from the government.
GLOBAL PARTNERS: What are other key factors?
DR. COSGROVE: Accountable healthcare is the result of two major things - Pay less as a result of doing more monitoring. The Cleveland Clinic has a lot of quality metrics now. We report 65 metrics to the government and are expecting to report 85 in the next couple of years. So we are working very hard to take cost out of our system through better measurements and reporting.
GLOBAL PARTNERS: Do you have a time horizon for ACO’s to be a reality? When will we see the Unicorn?
DR. COSGROVE: You know, where it falls in the priorities is going to determine how fast we’re going to see it implemented. I think it’s really as simple as that.
Simple wisdom puts complex issues in perspective to create advancements within organizations. In our interview with Dr. Cosgrove, and in our work with leading companies trying to do business better and smarter in a rapidly changing global marketplace, we often see that achieving breakthrough advancements often comes down to determining where they fall in the organization’s priorities.
Whether you are in healthcare or another industry, we are interested to hear how you prioritize and address the complex issues in your organization.
