An accountable care organization launched in 2012 by Blue Shield of California, Modesto, Calif.-based Doctors Medical Center and AllCare Independent Physician Association, improved on four quality benchmarks in its first year, according to a California Healthline report.
In its first year, the ACO saw improvement in the following areas:
• Hospital admissions: down 28.8 percent
• Number of hospital days: down 29.3 percent
• Average hospital length of stay: down 0.6 percent
• Emergency department visits: down 9.3 percent
To achieve these quality improvements, the ACO provides better coordinated care for patients through various means, such as scheduling follow-up appointments during discharge and having a nurse call to check in on the patient while they are at home, according to the report.
The ACO covered about 8,000 Blue Cross HMO patients in Stanislaus County in its first year.
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