The Challenge
For organizations with a large geographical footprint, it can be a challenge to proactively manage patient outcomes and deliver timely and seamless care. The Wisconsin Statewide Health Information Network (WISHIN) is an independent not-for-profit organization dedicated to bringing the benefits of widespread, secure and interoperable health information technology throughout the state of Wisconsin. WISHIN’s network has nearly 2,200 sites of care, and includes physicians, clinics, hospitals, health systems, pharmacies, clinical laboratories and health plans located in Wisconsin.
The sooner our participants have visibility into an encounter happening, the better they can coordinate care with their patient or member and avoid scenarios that negatively impact cost or quality.
Steve Rottmann WISHIN COO
The Solution
Today, WISHIN’s partnership with Bamboo Health complements and extends WISHIN’s capabilities as a health information exchange (HIE). Bamboo Health’s Pings™ solution pushes real-time notifications through to providers and payers enabling them to respond quickly to patient care events. Bamboo Health’s solutions are a first step in a process that allows providers to begin their care-coordination workflows.
Real-time alerts were particularly appropriate for WISHIN’s Medicaid managed care organizations (MCO) participants, which needed visibility into emergency department (ED) and inpatient admissions and discharges. This was to help avoid unnecessary ED utilization and to help the MCOs better manage certain chronic conditions. In addition, this helps lower costs for the entire Medicaid program, producing notifications when needed most. WISHIN participants are also able to leverage real-time alerts and notifications for transitional care management (TCM) billing opportunities, which could serve as a growth and sustainability opportunity for their organizations.
Through the partnership, WISHIN participants have access to Bamboo Health’s nationwide care coordination network. This means that not only do WISHIN participants have access to timely and actionable insights within Wisconsin, but they’re also able to glean insights from other providers wherever their patients are in the country. If a participant’s patient experiences a care event in a Florida hospital connected to Bamboo, the care team in Wisconsin will receive a real-time alert.
In addition, the partnership particularly extends the reach of WISHIN’s network through post-acute and home care. By joining WISHIN’s and Bamboo Health’s networks, the two organizations provide value by creating engagement opportunities between many facets of the care continuum.
Bamboo Health’s integration with WISHIN is an open system and EHR-agnostic. This means that regardless of an organization’s size and the EHR platform it uses, an organization can receive relevant and timely information across the network.
Further, Bamboo Health and WISHIN’s partnership allows members to receive up-to-date clinical data through a single sign-on system. With Bamboo Health, when WISHIN’s participants receive real-time notifications, they can easily and seamlessly view additional clinical detail on the patient from WISHIN without signing on to WISHIN Pulse and searching for the patient.
Through the partnership, WISHIN participants also have an improved ability to connect with their members with up-to-date contact information at their fingertips. According to WISHIN, “Having all the clinical data in the world doesn’t help our clients if they can’t make contact with their patients.”
The two organizations champion actionable interoperability through secure real-time information exchange and alerts that improve care coordination throughout and beyond Wisconsin.
“We were aware that many of our members were interested in real-time event notifications and we were looking for the best option to meet that customer demand. We also wanted a partner that would be able to support a single sign-on, between their system and ours. That knock at the door that something potentially significant has happened with a patient or member often requires additional context, and that information needs to be in one place. That’s how our partnership with Bamboo Health started.”
Joe Kachelski WISHIN CEO
The Results
Since the WISHIN and Bamboo Health partnership was formed:
- Roster-submitting organizations have seen a 22% decrease in emergency department (ED) to inpatient admission conversions since January of 2022, meaning that individuals are finding more appropriate treatment options rather than relying on the costly ED.
- WISHIN has added 200+ post-acute facilities to its network, which strengthens and adds to the data all WISHIN participants have across Wisconsin.
- WISHIN participants received 890,874 Pings in the past year from 1,075 unique facilities across 46 different states (including WI), meaning there have been more than 890,000 real-time alerts sent to an individual’s care team from the Pings platform. Overall, this improves the chances that patients are connected to the right care at the right time.
- Within the last year, there was an average of 306 clicks per month in WISHIN Pulse from the SSO integration with the Bamboo Health platform. This means that a patient’s care team was able to find updated information about a patient in one system rather than navigating between platforms.
- Since January 2022, more than $17 million in revenue potential has surfaced within the Pings platform for WISHIN participants that may bill for transitional care management (TCM).
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22%
decrease ED to inpatient conversions
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200+
added post-acute facilities
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75%
of Wisconsin hospital discharges are visible by WISHIN
About WISHIN
WISHIN is Wisconsin’s state-designated entity for electronic health information exchange. It is an independent not-for-profit organization dedicated to bringing the benefits of widespread, secure, interoperable health information technology to patients and caregivers throughout Wisconsin. WISHIN is operating and maintaining a statewide health information network to connect physicians, clinics, hospitals, pharmacies, and clinical laboratories across Wisconsin. Our vision is to promote and improve the health of individuals and communities in Wisconsin through the development of information-sharing services that facilitate electronic delivery of the right health information at the right place and right time, to the right individuals. Visit wishin.org to learn more.
About Bamboo Health
Bamboo Health empowers healthcare organizations to improve behavioral and physical health outcomes through the most powerful care collaboration network with Real-Time Care Intelligence™. By providing real-time insights during pivotal care moments, clients are enabled to perform life-improving actions and deliver seamless, high-quality and cost-effective whole-person healthcare. From coast to coast, Bamboo Health partners with five of the six major pharmacy chains, 52 states and territories, 100% of the top 10 best hospitals and more than half of the country’s largest health plans to improve more than 1 billion patient encounters annually.
