BOSTON, Nov. 4 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Children's Hospital Boston and its physicians are creating a unique partnership with the state's major health plans to accelerate the transformation of the pediatric care delivery system by expanding innovative approaches and models of care. The approaches and models currently being piloted at Children's are designed to improve health outcomes and reduce costs by eliminating care that is not effective and over utilized. The health plans - including Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts, Harvard Pilgrim Health Care and Tufts Health Plan - have agreed to an advisory role and to target funds toward the effort. The Massachusetts Medicaid Program has also agreed to participate.
To work with insurers to develop a common approach and standards toward improving care and reducing costs, Children's and its physicians have volunteered a cut in fiscal year 2010 payment rates; in some cases reopening contracts to cut rates of increase, and in others agreeing to reduce rates of increase during current contract negotiations. Children's and the health plans have agreed that a portion of these savings will be targeted to support these promising and novel approaches and models. Investments will support SCAMPs (a revolutionary way to provide clinicians with immediate feedback on the success of their treatments), new models and systems for pediatricians to work with specialists in coordinating care, and the most advanced pediatric information technology underpinning these efforts.
"Over the past several years, we've made patient quality and safety our top priority, invested in our clinical health information systems and tackled hospital-wide operational improvement," said Sandra Fenwick, President and COO at Children's.
"Those efforts have provided the confidence and platform on which to launch this next generation of clinical effectiveness tools
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