Premier Healthcare Alliance Experts to Address Health Reform, ACOs, Industry Trends

CHARLOTTE, N.C.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Experts from the Premier healthcare alliance will speak around the country in January and February discussing health reform, accountable care organizations (ACOs) and healthcare industry trends.

Premier President and CEO Susan DeVore will discuss engaging stakeholders around ACOs to improve quality and efficiency at the AHIP 2011 Executive Leadership Summit in Phoenix on February 4. More than 90 health systems representing more than 300 hospitals are participating in Premier’s new Accountable Care Collaboratives.

Also on that day, Richard Bankowitz, M.D., M.B.A., F.A.C.P., Premier enterprise-wide chief medical officer, and Howard Salmon, vice president of Premier Consulting Solutions, will speak at the Chief of Staff Boot Camp in Orlando. They will discuss using comparative data to improve performance and how clinical integration is key to payment reform. Bankowitz was recently named one of the Top 25 Clinical Informacists by Modern Healthcare magazine.

On January 25, Carolyn Scott, R.N., M.E.D., M.H.A., Premier vice president of Performance Improvement and Quality, will speak during a HFMA webinar about Premier’s QUEST®: High Performing Hospitals Year 2 results. In two years, hospitals participating in QUEST saved an estimated 22,164 lives and reduced healthcare spending by $2.13 billion. If all hospitals in the country had been able to achieve similar results, estimates project an additional 64,000 lives and $23 billion could have been saved.

Vice President of Business Development for Premier, Jeff Petry, will moderate an ACO panel and participate in a keynote panel at the HomeCare 100 in Laguna Niguel, California, on February 15. The ACO panel will discuss how ACOs work and the steps integrated systems must take to ensure success. During the keynote panel, clinical, economic and political challenges associated with ACO creation will be discussed from the perspective of various healthcare entities across the continuum of care.

Randy Thomas, Premier vice president of Integrated Product Management and Marketing, will speak at the HIMSS 2011 Annual Conference and Exhibition in Orlando on February 22. She will discuss the reforming role of healthcare information technology and value-based purchasing, and provide lessons learned from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services/Premier Hospital Quality Incentive Demonstration™ (HQID) value-based purchasing project. Hospitals in the project raised their overall quality by an average of 18.3 percent over five years.

Barbara Gray, Premier vice president of AC Collaboratives, will also speak at the conference leading an ACO panel on the strategic directions of ACOs from a provider-organization perspective.

On January 25, during the World Congress Supply Chain Summit in Washington, D.C., Premier Vice President of Operations, Durral Gilbert, will discuss Premier’s Spring 2011 Economic Outlook analysis. The analysis gives insight into economic and industry healthcare trends impacting the supply chain and operational costs. Last quarter’s analysis reported that hospitals were seeing a thaw in capital expenditures.

Also on January 25, Leslie Schultz Ph.D., Premier director of Knowledge Transfer will discuss supporting patient safety through quality at the Carolinas Center for Medical Excellence in Columbia, S.C.

Brent Hardaway, vice president of Premier Consulting Solutions will speak at Abbott Nutrition’s national sales meeting on February 15. He will give an overview of health reform and ACOs, as well as the strategic considerations that should be taken into account prior to launch.

Also on that day, Gray will speak on a Northwest Regional Telehealth Resource Center webinar. She will give an overview of ACOs and discuss the current state of the regulations and what organizations are doing to prepare, as well as how telemedicine service directors can assist.

On January 27, Danielle Lloyd, M.P.H., Premier senior director of reimbursement policy, will speak at the West Virginia HFMA Winter Conference in Charleston, W. Va. She will give a legislative update on the health reform provisions affecting providers and discuss how they will proceed through the regulatory process.

Marci Jackson, Premier manager of Knowledge Transfer, will speak at the Society for Health Systems in Orlando on February 19. She will identify tools to enable clinical improvement for evidence-based care delivery.

About the Premier healthcare alliance, Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award recipient

Premier is a performance improvement alliance of more than 2,400 U.S. hospitals and 72,000-plus other healthcare sites using the power of collaboration to lead the transformation to high quality, cost-effective care. Owned by hospitals, health systems and other providers, Premier maintains the nation's most comprehensive repository of clinical, financial and outcomes information and operates a leading healthcare purchasing network. A world leader in helping deliver measurable improvements in care, Premier works with the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services and the United Kingdom's National Health Service North West to improve hospital performance. Headquartered in Charlotte, N.C., Premier also has an office in Washington. http://www.premierinc.com. Stay connected with Premier on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.