What Success Looks Like
A highly-functioning Integrated Delivery System (IDS) should provide patients with access to high-quality primary care which connects to a continuum of care that is patient-centered and transfers the skills needed to manage an individual’s health care and health outcomes.
The keys to reducing hospitalization and long-term care are keeping individuals healthier longer, avoiding acute crisis through monitoring and proactively managing the individual’s physical and behavioral health, and coordination with the social services they require.
While Integrated Delivery Systems can be structured a number of ways, from multispecialty group practices with a loose hospital affiliation to fully integrated delivery and financing systems, successful IDSs share a number of common characteristics:
- Network of Providers and Partners
- Provide Comprehensive Services across the Continuum of Care
- Embraced Patient-Centered Approaches to Care Delivery
- Willing to Share Risks and Incentives
- Connected via Advanced Information Technology
Providers and community health workers, working together to engage patients and coordinate and manage their care, will create healthier, happier, and more satisfied patients, faster recovery for those who are ill or hospitalized, improved quality of life and lower health care costs.