Editor’s note: This commentary is by Amy Cooper, executive director of the Accountable Care Coalition of the Green Mountains. ACCGM was established in July 2012 by the independent community physicians of Healthfirst and services approximately 6,500 Medicare fee-for-service beneficiaries.
We applaud the Green Mountain Care Board’s decision to allow ClearChoiceMD to proceed with their plans to open five new urgent care centers in the state of Vermont. We believe the introduction of these alternative settings of care could have a profoundly positive impact on bringing down the cost of care and improving the experience of patients in the state. Providing easy access to urgent care is crucial to effective community-based health care.
There is high use of hospital emergency rooms for non-urgent problems among Medicare patients in Vermont. This pattern of emergency room utilization is costly and inefficient, both for ER doctors who are distracted from dealing with life-threatening emergencies to stich up minor cuts, and for patients who spend hours waiting in line behind more urgent cases to have someone look at their fractured pinky finger; but without a strong network of urgent care centers to recommend to our patients as an alternative, our ability to disrupt this pattern of emergency room use is limited.
If this new organization acts as they are incentivized to, and as you would expect them to, then they will be a great partner to us and to other organizations interested in disrupting the costly patterns of care that have existed in this state.
The GMCB’s decision to pave the way to bring more urgent care centers to the state was extremely positive for patients and for all those, like us, who are actively trying to improve the patient experience and bring down the cost of health care.
The time is right to welcome a health care organization to the state that has one clear focus: the treatment of non-urgent problems. The time is also right to recognize that a private company offering urgent care services has all the right incentives to aid those of us who are accountable for lowering costs and improving the quality of health. It is our expectation that such an organization will educate potential patients on when to use the urgent care center versus an ER, that they will locate in high-traffic areas that are easily accessible for the greatest number of potential patients, and that they will strive to provide an experience that physicians and patients regard as high-quality so their business will grow.
If this new organization acts as they are incentivized to, and as you would expect them to, then they will be a great partner to us and to other organizations interested in disrupting the costly patterns of care that have existed in this state.
