With care management and engagement tools, the Franciscan Alliance healthcare ministry was able to generate $2.2 million in savings across multiple Medicare and Medicare Advantage plans, according to an announcement Wednesday.

The Franciscan health system leveraged the Innovaccer platform to reduce readmissions, automate emergency department workflows and improve the patient experience, the company said.

Creating savings with high-risk protocols

Of note, the Indiana-based multi-specialty network implemented customizable polypharmacy protocols that manage high-risk prescriptions to coordinate care. 

Automated pre-visit planning helped prevent downstream utilization, such as inpatient visits, while helping to deliver more comprehensive patient care. That saved Franciscan $481,000 for its MSSP population and $388,000 for its Medicare Advantage population and avoided a total of 75 inpatient visits across both populations during the measuring period.

The 493 polypharmacy protocols enabled clinical ambulatory pharmacists to track medication plans for comorbid risk populations and maintain continuous engagement with patients post-discharge, generating more than $985,000 in savings.

The health system's physician ambulatory network is using Innovaccer's population health management suite to improve clinical processes and streamline operations. The electronic health record system-agnostic tools are used by many stakeholders, including the health system's medical coders. 

With the integration of streamlining coding processes and advanced risk adjustment analytics that used historical claims and clinical data, Franciscan dropped HCC code identification at the point of care, achieving a 2.8% improvement in coding gap closure rate across populations.

Automated coding processes helped Franciscan realize $312,000 in value, Innovaccer said.

To streamline emergency room discharge planning and expedite follow-up care, automated alerts helped Franciscan nurses perform more timely outreach and record care episodes

Automating processes to improve patient care

Franciscan has long looked to technology to automate processes, including outpatient appointment registration and check-in and checkout during visits, according to Craig Miller, administrative director of ambulatory services.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Franciscan expanded telehealth offerings and remote patient monitoring programs to identify opportunities to better connect patients with care teams across the care continuum, Miller told Healthcare IT News in December.

To close gaps in care, "We focused on broad rollout across our physicians and providers to support ambulatory as well as inpatient patients, and to close the gaps in transitions of care, or fragmentation," he said previously.