« The Dual Agenda: April 30, 2015 Issue
Featured Resources
New Brief on Dual Eligibles in Nursing Home Facilities
The Integrated Care Resource Center published a technical assistance brief that highlights how states and health plans can work together to reduce avoidable hospitalizations for Medicare-Medicaid enrollees living in nursing facilities. The brief suggests that in contracting with health plans, states can promote efforts to reduce avoidable hospitalizations through contract requirements and performance incentives and performance improvement projects. Similarly, with support from the state, health plans can employ tools to work with nursing facilities, hospitals, physicians, pharmacists, enrollees and their families to achieve that goal. States can play a stronger role by making changes in Medicaid fee-for-service nursing facility payment systems by reducing incentives for hospitalizations.
Advances and Opportunities in Health Care for Low-Income Californians
Blue Shield of California Foundation recently hosted a webinar that highlighted findings from their report on the needs of low-income California residents. The research spans 2011-2014. Among the key findings are:
- For the first time in the Foundation’s research, more than half of low-income Californians rate the quality of their health care as excellent or very good
- More low-income Californians now report that they see the same provider on a consistent basis, which is important because continuity of care is one of the single strongest predictors of patient satisfaction and loyalty to a care facility
- Many of the individual patient experience ratings improved, including a 13-point increase in clinic patients' rating of staff courtesy