New Orleans, LA, Aug. 26, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Louisiana’s largest ACO, the Ochsner Accountable Care Network, LLC (OACN), released its 2020 performance results today, showing reductions in its expected cost of care by more than $30.3 million for its 31,000 Medicare beneficiaries. This is OACN’s fourth consecutive year of savings, marking a 163 percent increase in savings since 2017. The 2020 results positioned OACN as one of the nation’s top ACOs, now number 13 out of 513 organizations. Of the 99 ACOs with 30,000+ Medicare beneficiaries, OACN achieved the second highest savings rate in the country.
“OACN’s 2020 performance demonstrates the power of our clinically integrated network, bringing together providers, sharing best practices, and creating efficiencies to lower costs and improve quality of care,” said David Carmouche, MD, Executive Vice-President of Value Based Care and Network Operations, Ochsner Health, and President, Ochsner Health Network. “Just last year, we saved nearly $1,000 per beneficiary – a direct result of our provider network’s shared vision and close collaboration between clinicians and patients.”
“Remarkably, these unprecedented savings were realized during a year of extraordinary challenges,” he continued. “COVID-19 exacerbated healthcare disparities, broadly impacting the already vulnerable populations we serve. Despite these extreme pressures, our team pioneered solutions to improve access, quality and cost of care.”
OACN’s 2020 performance results demonstrated key efforts that contributed to multi-dimensional improvements and shared savings, including:
- Improving utilization:
- Reduced in emergency department visits by 20 percent
- Reduced in in-patient hospitalizations by 17 percent
- Improving cost of care:
- Saved more than $30 million in Medicare dollars, nearly $1000 per beneficiary
- Improving care quality:
- Scored 98.13 percent across CMS Medicare Shared Savings Program measures
- Improving access to care:
- Launched virtual and in-home wellness visit capabilities
- Converted 90,000 Medicare office visits into virtual visits
- Improving population health data:
- Deployed tools and technology that identified and predicted health risks in patients
- Leveraged robust health data, tools, and technologies to support clinicians in outreaching to and caring for vulnerable patients with chronic conditions
“OACN’s 2020 results demonstrate the return on investments we have made in sophisticated analytics tools and technologies,” said Sidney “Beau” Raymond, MD, Medical Director of OACN. “By leveraging these tools, our providers and staff are better equipped to collaborate and make data-driven decisions to improve patient outreach, care and in turn, bend the cost curve.”
OACN is an Accountable Care Organization (ACO) that consists of more than 2,700 providers throughout Louisiana and Mississippi.
“OACN empowers providers to better care for our communities,” said Rowe Sanders Crowder, III, MD, OACN Partner. “Through the network, we’re able to realize efficiencies and share best practices to deliver a higher quality of care at a lower cost.”
OACN was founded in 2013 to ensure that patients, especially those with chronic conditions, get the right care, at the right time, in the right place. The network is dedicated to improving health outcomes and supports population health efforts across Louisiana and the Gulf South. As the largest ACO in Louisiana, OACN’s team includes Ochsner-employed and community providers in New Orleans, Baton Rouge, St. Tammany Parish, Houma, and South Mississippi.
ACOs are groups of physicians, hospitals and other healthcare providers who come together voluntarily to provide coordinated, quality care to Medicare patients. The goal of an ACO is to improve efficiency and coordination of care, resulting in improved care delivery and reduced healthcare costs to both the patient and organization. Patients see the benefit of an ACO through improved communication with their healthcare teams and reduced duplication in paperwork and medical tests.
For more information about OACN’s participants or past performance, please visit ochsneracn.org.
###
About Ochsner Health Network
Anchored by Ochsner Health System, OHN was founded in 2015 with the following health system partners – Ochsner Health System, Ochsner LSU Health North Louisiana, Lafayette General Health, Slidell Memorial Hospital, St. Tammany Parish Hospital and Terrebonne General Medical Center. These leading health systems, their employed physician groups, and affiliated community physicians across the greater Gulf South comprise a network that is a leader in healthcare delivery innovation and is one of the largest and most advanced Clinically Integrated Networks (CIN) in the nation. For more information, please visit ochsnerhealthnetwork.org.
