Florida Blue, Baptist Health South Florida and Baptist Health Quality Network (BHQN) announced the execution of an accountable care agreement that aims to improve the quality and efficiency of patient care in South Florida.
Through this arrangement, the organizations plan to improve the patient experience, while also decreasing medical costs, by enhancing the coordination of care between Baptist Health South Florida, the Baptist Health Quality Network, and Florida Blue.
As of March 1, the accountable care program utilizes a value-based compensation structure and serves as another example of the parties’ innovative efforts being deployed. It will decrease medical costs and increase quality outcomes by rewarding the right combination of goals, including transparency, care coordination, consumer empowerment and lack of redundancy.
This agreement marks the second value-based relationship between Florida Blue and Baptist Health South Florida. In May 2012, Florida Blue, Baptist Health South Florida and Advanced Medical Specialties introduced an accountable care model specific to the treatment of cancer. The partnership was an early commercial accountable care agreement, and one of the first in the nation to address a specific medical condition. Early results indicate that this program is exceeding its goals for quality and efficiency of care.
“We are pleased to expand our accountable care collaboration with Baptist Health South Florida,” said Andy Marino, vice president of Delivery System for Florida Blue. “Both organizations realize first-hand the importance of honing their population health management capabilities in an effort to reduce medical costs and improve quality. That is why we wanted to expand our value-based model beyond oncology to include more members in south Florida.”
“We are equally excited about our new partnership with Florida Blue and view it as an important step in engaging all constituents to work together (the patient, providers and the health plan) to improve the delivery of health care,” said Ralph Lawson, Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of Baptist Health South Florida.
“The Baptist Health Quality Network looks forward to collaborating with Florida Blue and developing initiatives to promote quality improvements and cost savings,” said Jonathan Fialkow, M.D., Executive Medical Director of Baptist Health Quality Network.
