Jan 14 : ABILITY Network and CareCentrix Announce Strategic Partnership

ABILITY Network, a leading healthcare technology company, and CareCentrix, the nation’s leader in managing patient care to the home, today announced a strategic partnership to enhance communications and workflow within the transition of care process for patients leaving the hospital.

As patients transition across the continuum of healthcare, breakdowns in communication can have a significant impact on their clinical outcomes and experiences, as well as the experiences of the staff working with them. In fact, according to the Joint Commission, 62 percent of accidental deaths and 80 percent of serious medical errors are linked to communication failures. This newly formed partnership between CareCentrix and ABILITY will help address these unacceptable communication failures and transform care coordination processes to reduce avoidable readmissions and improve overall patient satisfaction.

“This is an exciting partnership that we believe will have a huge impact,” said Mark Briggs, ABILITY Chief Executive Officer. “ABILITY and CareCentrix share a common vision: improving the healthcare experience in this country. Working together, our organizations will be able to simplify and streamline the transition of care experience for thousands of providers and the patients they care for.”

To do this, the ABILITY transition of care service, known as ABILITY | ILLUMINATE, will integrate with CareCentrix’s care coordination platform. This integration will automatically inform discharge planners when a patient’s home health, durable medical equipment (DME) and home infusion therapy (HIT) should be managed by CareCentrix. The referral information will then be electronically communicated directly to CareCentrix without faxing or phone calls, making the process faster, easier and more effective. The team of care coordinators at CareCentrix will then find the right network of providers to staff each case and send them the necessary information to help ensure a smooth transition for patients.

As a result of this partnership, the ABILITY | ILLUMINATE service will allow CareCentrix to keep the discharge planner better informed with more timely information. What’s more, ABILITY | ILLUMINATE does not require integration with electronic medical records (EMR) systems, making it easier and more cost-effective to implement. The collaboration will also help payers control costs by placing patients into pre-approved, quality providers, helping improve outcomes and reduce readmissions.

“Our focus continues to be providing every patient the opportunity to live and heal in their home as much as they can for as long as they can,” said John Driscoll, Chief Executive Officer of CareCentrix. “The partnership with ABILITY takes this to a new level. Now we can communicate with discharge planners earlier and more effectively to help ensure that care is tailored to each individual’s needs. With ABILITY’s connections to thousands of hospitals and post-acute providers across the country, it will be easier for more patients to get the most appropriate care in the best available setting.”

About ABILITY

ABILITY Network is a leading healthcare technology company trusted by more than one hundred thousand providers across the continuum of care in ambulatory, acute, and post-acute settings. ABILITY provides a broad suite of innovative workflow services to help manage the administrative and clinical complexities of healthcare. ABILITY is headquartered in Minneapolis, with anchor offices in Boston, Parsippany and Tampa, and satellite offices across the country.

About CareCentrix

CareCentrix is the leader in managing care to the home. Headquartered in Hartford, Conn., CareCentrix has approximately 1,400 employees and a nationwide network of nearly 8,000 credentialed provider locations. CareCentrix serves leading health plans across the U.S. with a range of products and services that leverage the home and community-based settings. We help payers and providers lower costs and improve outcomes for health plans and consumers. We provide optimal access to quality home care for more than 23 million lives by connecting providers with patients and helping them navigate the complex home care system. Our extensive range of services provides support for patients and their families in every step of the healing process, including home health, durable medical equipment (DME), home infusion, sleep management and HomeSTAR, which helps improve care transitions and reduce readmissions. Visit www.carecentrix.com.