Becker's Hospital Review

34 CFO / FINANCE Intermountain to Save $70M Over 3 Years by Transitioning Employees to R1 RCM By Alyssa Rege S alt Lake City-based Intermountain Healthcare announced Jan. 24 it would transfer roughly 2,300 nonclinical employees to a new employer, saving the institution roughly $70 million during the next three years. The 2,300 individuals will become employees of R1 RCM, a revenue cycle management services provider. The transition will be effective in April. Intermountain and R1 initially partnered in 2011. Intermountain has em- ployed R1 employees at several of its facilities for the last six years. "Everyone recognizes the cost of healthcare in the U.S. is too high," said Intermountain Health COO Robert Allen. "We owe it to the patients and communities we serve to explore and implement options such as this to help address this issue of affordability." Mr. Allen added the expected $70 million in savings during the next three years is "money we won't have to ask our patients for. Plus, new jobs will be coming to Utah that will help strengthen the economy." Under the partnership, all current Intermountain employees transitioning to R1 will retain a job at their current rate of pay and employees will be able to continue working at their current work site in most cases. The 22-hospital system revealed it planned to reorganize its operations late last year, according to the Deseret News. n Care New England, Partners to Enter Into Definitive Agreement to Merge After Nearly 1 Year By Alyssa Rege P rovidence, R.I.-based Care New England and Boston-based Partners HealthCare agreed to enter into a definitive agreement to merge Jan. 25. Officials from both organizations said in a joint statement the latest prog- ress in their talks "marks an important milestone." The health systems have engaged in exclusive discussions since last April, and later agreed to extend the talks through Jan. 31. Officials said the health systems will extend negotiations until a definitive agreement is for- mally in place, the Boston Globe reports. Partners HealthCare President and CEO David Torchiana, MD, said in a statement the "lengthy discussions" between the two organizations "solid- ified [Partners'] interest" in Care New England. The announcement came roughly two weeks after Providence-based Brown University proposed an unsolicited joint bid with Los Angeles-based Prospect Medical Holdings to partner with Care New England. Care New England said Jan. 25 its "strong educational and research rela- tionship [with Brown University] will continue to play a critical role in the healthcare landscape and its future development." n Healthcare Spending Up 4.6%, While Service Use Plateaus: 5 Things to Know By Morgan Haefner W hile healthcare spending depends on price and service use, substantial hikes in healthcare spending be- tween 2012 and 2016 were mainly due to price increases, according to a recent Health Care Cost Institute report. e 2016 Health Care Cost and Utilization Re- port examines HCCI's commercial claims data- base. HCCI used the database, which comprises information on Americans under age 65 covered through employer-sponsored health plans, to analyze overall health system costs from 2012 to 2016. Here are five key findings from the report. Healthcare spending 1. Americans under the age of 65 with employ- er-sponsored health plans spent more on health- care than ever, with spending growing faster in 2016 than in recent years. Per person, total healthcare spending grew 4.6 percent in 2016. at's compared to 4.1 percent in 2015, and fol- lows two years of lower than 3 percent growth from 2012 to 2014. 2. In 2016, per-person healthcare spending for commercially insured individuals grew to $5,407. 3. e main culprit of spending growth from 2012 to 2016 was price increases. Prices grew each year and across almost all service categories in that period, with the greatest price increases seen in prescription drugs (up 24.9 percent) and inpatient services (up 24.3 percent). Healthcare use 4. While total healthcare spending grew in 2016, use of most healthcare services held still or fell. is happened year over year and during the 2012 to 2016 period. 5. e only service that didn't fall during the 2012 to 2016 period was prescription drug use, which grew by 1.8 percent. Inpatient services saw the largest decrease in the same period, fall- ing by 12.9 percent. n

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