Tech-Enabled Managed Services Improves Analytics Capabilities and Decreases Costs

THE NEED FOR IMPROVED ANALYTICS CAPABILITIES

Many health systems continue to operate with weak margins, requiring organizations to look for new opportunities to streamline operations, improve efficiency, and decrease costs. This often involves employing new strategies and implementing innovative technologies to optimize operational efficiency and enhance patient care while managing expenses to strengthen financial stability.

TRANSFORMING THE USE OF DATA AND ANALYTICS

Carle Health chose to streamline its processes to support organizational decisions and improve patient outcomes. The organization was transforming; it was changing how it used data and analytics. Organizational demand for robust data and analytics increased, but with this increased demand came escalating costs, and the business intelligence team couldn’t effectively meet demand.

In addition to the increased demand, the organization also faced difficulty recruiting and retaining the analytics talent it needed and didn’t have the resources to implement and maintain professional development pathways for its analytics team members. Carle Health needed a solution that would allow it to scale analytics efficiently and effectively across the entire enterprise.

PARTNERING FOR SUCCESS

Carle Health chose to strengthen its partnership with Health Catalyst, expanding to an all-access technology subscription plus Tech-Enabled Managed Services in analytics, data management, reporting, and project management.

Gaining access to analytics expertise

The organization transitioned employment of its business intelligence team members to Health Catalyst. These Tech-Enabled Managed Services team members provide expert analytics support and innovation to the entire Carle Health system. Carle Health gained broader access to analytics experts and the best practices to scale analytics across its enterprise. The team members gained access to technology, analytics and data science expertise, and development pathways that provide skills training and career growth.

Implementing new processes

Carle Health and the Tech-Enabled Managed Services team implemented new processes for opportunity identification, project prioritization, and project management. Teams use the KPA Analytics Accelerator to quantify variation within clinical care processes and assess the impact of improving care delivery. Carle Health uses the data to understand the drivers of organizational performance and prioritize improvement and analytics initiatives.

Providing self-service analytics

The provider organization, Carle Health, and the health plan, Health Alliance, use the Health Catalyst Pop Analyzer™ application to improve efficiency and provide self-service analytics. Previously, analytics team members were overwhelmed by high volumes of custom analytics requests and reports. Now, end users can efficiently perform ad hoc analyses using Pop Analyzer. Drag-and-drop filters within the visually oriented application make it easy for non-analyst end users to quickly ask and answer questions, freeing analysts to take on higher-level analytics projects.

Enabling data-informed decision making

Health Alliance uses the Health Catalyst Value Optimizer™ application to inform its value-based care strategy to achieve success in population health management. Leaders can identify the most valuable benchmarked opportunities for improvement, providing teams actionable guidance.

Carle Health uses the Healthcare.AI™ suite, integrating statistical and machine learning techniques into its business intelligence tools, producing higher-quality insights faster and improving the effectiveness of leadership decision-making. For example, Carle Health sought to understand length of stay (LOS) drivers. Team members had ideas about the factors contributing to prolonged LOS and were considering establishing an improvement team to address one of the root causes. Using comparative analytics, Carle Health determined that the suspected root cause was not contributing to prolonged LOS. Armed with better insights, the organization was able to focus improvement efforts on interventions that would make the most significant impact and avoided spending time and money on interventions that wouldn’t have produced the desired results.

RESULTS

The Carle Health and Health Catalyst Tech-Enabled Managed Services partnership is helping transform how Carle Health uses data and analytics to improve organizational performance and patient outcomes.

• In the first year of the Tech-Enabled Managed Services relationship, Carle Health gained economies of scale, contained escalating costs, and decreased costs by millions. The organization is efficiently scaling analytics across the enterprise, has advanced analytics adoption and acumen, and is advancing analytics maturity.
• 96 percent of team members who transitioned to Health Catalyst remain employed one year later, stabilizing daily operations. Team member engagement has increased and is greater than 70 percent of those in the Gallup database.

“Health Catalyst’s Tech-Enabled Managed Services has exceeded our expectations. The rigor, standards, and best-practice processes have meaningfully advanced analytics at Carle Health and decreased costs.”

Suzanne Sampson, MBA, PMP, FACHE, Senior Vice President, Transformation Services Division, Carle Health

WHAT’S NEXT

Carle Health will continue to use analytics to improve operational effectiveness and patient outcomes. The organization plans to use PowerCosting™ to gain an accurate, comprehensive view of all costs, improve the effectiveness of cost accounting, and identify actionable improvement opportunities.

ADDITIONAL READING

• Analytics Improves Population Health Operational Insight and Reduces Labor Costs
• Analytics Enables Identification of Opportunities to Improve Value and Accountable Care Organization Performance
• A Prescription for Success: Embedded Decision Support Improves Refill Timeliness and Saves $1.6M
• Automating Professional Practice Evaluation Improves Quality and Saves Thousands of Labor Hours
• Data Platform Supports Acquisition of Practices and Network Growth, Increasing Revenue