Issue link: https://beckershealthcare.uberflip.com/i/1007936
84 Executive Roundtable between partners — health systems and payers — as we begin to think differently about how to drive better outcomes and create higher quality care at a more appropriate cost. BW: Truly our biggest barrier today is obtaining complete data and capturing it in a timely manner. This is a challenge across the entire healthcare continuum, whether you are looking at hospitals, health systems or the post-acute setting. We can successfully overcome this by developing efficient data capture processes and integrating it into the care process, which provides the training clinicians need to understand the value of this information. MD: The biggest barrier is aggregating and synthesizing data from the different potential sources we may have. That's a healthcare issue not unique to us. How do we integrate, within the entire spectrum of care providers, to have one record, one view of the patient? We need to establish strategic partnerships, exchanging data and building platforms to ensure we are working collectively. We cannot do this in a silo. Q: How can acute and post-acute providers better support each other in terms of data collection and sharing? BW: The first step is to make certain the definition of the data is consistent. How we define certain data points is different from one home infusion provider to another. Having that common dictionary across the acute and post-acute environment is important — anything we can do to make communication simpler and not require duplicate entries. At Option Care, we have developed a secure texting and scanning platform so providers can quickly exchange data in a safe manner, however, the ultimate solution would be to have our systems become integrated and able to communicate directly. JR: The ability for bidirectional sharing of information is the biggest opportunity for Option Care as we look forward. For any of us to spend time retyping information or collecting paper and trying to make it digital doesn't make sense. The more we can find ways to electronically transfer data in a safe and effective way, the more both acute and post-acute providers will benefit. Q: How can providers be sure they are collecting "the right data" today that will help drive insights tomorrow? JR: It's starting with the end in mind. Option Care is spending a lot of time right now thinking about how to look at data as an asset. How do we develop a master data strategy and think ahead about some of the data elements we will need to continue to push ourselves forward? It's also having scalable systems along with the ability to expand and add data components as information becomes available. You can't close off and have a hard-walled system that prevents you from adding elements as the market evolves. The other thing we are doing is working with innovators, in both pharmaceutical and service areas, to get a good sense of how they are trying to build data into their business. The more we can have those collaborative conversations and work together around driving better patient outcomes, that's where we collectively win. MD: We have a cross-functional team — clinical, operations, technology, business intelligence and analytics, and customer- facing teams — really trying to pull together a comprehensive view of what data is both meaningful for our customers as well as what data we need to improve our ability to execute predictive modeling and patient care. We are trying to get at this with the internal cross-functional teams as well as interfacing with health systems, physicians, health plans and drug manufacturers to ensure we are addressing the needs of the future. Q: How does Option Care's new technology support optimization of patient outcomes? MD: With Option Care's ability to collect and digitize clinical notes, we will develop and refine care pathways. For example, when we launch a product for patients, we can collect specific data on patients' responses to that therapy at the point of care. This will help us assess our ability to keep patients persistent to that therapy and decide if that therapy is delivering the desired outcomes while managing the underlying disease. Our technology allows us to capture, track and report that data as well as understand the patient's response to therapy. If patients aren't being persistent, what interventions do we need to do, and when? We can assess that data and create other pathways to get to the desired outcome. JR: We are replacing our entire core technology infrastructure with the idea that data is an asset and we need to keep the end in mind. We are building out a business intelligence and data analytics capability set, which will allow us to do more in-depth data interrogation and pattern recognition, ultimately getting to a point where we have predictive modeling. If we can look at things with predictive modeling and identify where an intervention by one of our clinicians is going to drive a better outcome, that's the future of medicine. It's about utilizing your knowledgeable workers and clinical expertise to its fullest. Coupled with that, we are doing a lot of work to understand the patient journey. We have a journey map exercise going on to understand those touch points at a patient level, even before they get to us and potentially after they leave us. It's really important to understand what we are passing back to patients, their referring physicians, hospitals systems or pharmaceutical manufacturers. We are looking at all those stakeholders as we design that infrastructure. Option Care plays a small but important role in the overall way healthcare is delivered in this country. We also recognize that if we can connect with and understand the stakeholders' unmet needs as well as how to work more efficiently with them, we all win. n At Option Care, we build partnerships across healthcare by putting our patients at the center. We also offer signature services that provide nationwide comprehensive clinical management from their home or alternative treatment site. Together, we are improving the quality of home infusion care, reducing healthcare costs, and making a positive difference in each patient's life. Visit optioncare. com to learn more.