MEDecision Innovation Award Goes to Blue Cross Blue Shield of Minnesota

• Honor recognizing inventive use of technology given at 15th Annual MEDecision User Conference
• Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota wins for utilizing Alineo™ platform to enable Whole Person Health Support model
• Lovelace Health Plan and KePRO are finalists

PHILADELPHIA--(BUSINESS WIRE)--MEDecision, Inc., a leading provider of collaborative health care management solutions, today announced that Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota (Blue Cross) has been named the winner of the Third Annual MEDecision Innovation Award. The honor recognizes the organization that implements a MEDecision product or technology in the most unique and/or innovative way. Other finalists included The Keystone Peer Review Organization, Inc. (KePRO), a Harrisburg-based quality improvement and care management organization, and Lovelace Health Plan of New Mexico.

“With technology poised to play an even bigger role in the future of health care, it’s important to encourage innovative thinking and new ideas”

“With technology poised to play an even bigger role in the future of health care, it’s important to encourage innovative thinking and new ideas,” said MEDecision President and COO Scott A. Storrer. “Customization and adaptability are inherent design features in all of MEDecision’s solutions. The Innovation Award is our way of recognizing our users for using our products in innovative ways that help them meet market challenges.”

Blue Cross’ innovation showcased its distinctive use of MEDecision’s Alineo™ collaborative health care management platform. The organization has deployed Alineo to facilitate Whole Person Health Support^sm, an initiative it has launched to identify opportunities to improve members’ health status and reduce health care costs by assessing such factors as known gaps in care, the member’s ability to work more closely with their provider and the member’s likelihood to engage in interventions. Alineo provides the advanced case and disease management capabilities necessary to support the Whole Person Health Support model.

The two finalists also demonstrated superior innovation in their award submissions.

Lovelace Health Plan’s entry involved a multi-faceted use of the MEDecision Clinical Summary, a payer-based electronic health record. The insurer has included use of the Clinical Summary in a variety of programs for certain Medicaid populations, employer groups and other members. By furnishing providers with more complete, comprehensive and timely patient information, the Clinical Summary has enabled Lovelace to improve its members’ health outcomes and contain costs.

In its entry, KePRO described how it uses MEDecision’s auto-approval technology to reduce reviewer costs and lower administrative overhead expenses. By automating certain high-frequency diagnoses and resulting admissions requests, KePRO generated significant cost, time and resource savings for both itself and its clients. In one contract alone the innovation last year resulted in 90,000 auto-approvals and a $250,000 savings. The insurer is now planning to implement the process system-wide.

The MEDecision Innovation Award is given as part of the company's annual User Conference. Being held May 6-8, this year’s event gathers representatives from 24 nationwide health insurers for three days of presentations, demonstrations, workshops and seminars designed to help them improve care management programs through the optimal use of MEDecision’s solutions. Conference highlights include keynote addresses by a number of industry experts focusing on some of health information technology’s most pertinent and emerging issues, particularly health care reform initiatives and the economy.

Prior to the start of the User Conference, MEDecision conducted its sixth Annual Chief Medical Officer (CMO) Forum. The event brought together numerous senior physician executives from throughout MEDecision’s client roster to discuss their respective achievements and challenges in optimizing care management.

The Innovation Award finalists and winner were selected by the User Conference Committee, a group of MEDecision customer representatives and employees charged with planning and executing the event.

For more information about the MEDecision 2009 User Conference, see http://www.medecision.com/user_conference/Content.aspx.

For more information about MEDecision, please visit www.MEDecision.com and subscribe to an RSS feed at http://www.MEDecision.com/blog/. Follow the company on Twitter at @MEDecision.

Recent News and Resources

MEDecision News Releases:

• MEDecision Opens 15^th Annual User Conference; http://www.businesswire.com/portal/site/medecision/?ndmViewId=news_view&newsId=20090506005306&newsLang=en
• MEDecision Conducts Sixth Annual Chief Medical Officer Forum; http://www.businesswire.com/portal/site/medecision/?ndmViewId=news_view&newsId=20090505005459&newsLang=en
• MEDecision Extends First Quarter Momentum With Successful HIMSS Conference; http://www.businesswire.com/portal/site/medecision/?ndmViewId=news_view&newsId=20090422005378&newsLang=en
• MEDecision to Acquire HxTechnologies, Inc.; http://www.businesswire.com/portal/site/medecision/?ndmViewId=news_view&newsId=20090401006174&newsLang=en

MEDecision Blog: http://www.MEDecision.com/blog

MEDecision Webinars: http://www.MEDecision.com/webinar.aspx

About Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota

Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota, with headquarters in the St. Paul suburb of Eagan, was chartered in 1933 as Minnesota’s first health plan and continues to carry out its charter mission today: to promote a wider, more economical and timely availability of health services for the people of Minnesota. A nonprofit, taxable organization, Blue Cross is the largest health plan based in Minnesota. Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota is an independent licensee of the Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association, headquartered in Chicago. For more information, please visit www.bluecrossmn.com.

About KePRO

KePRO, a leading quality improvement and care management organization, offers innovative and outcomes-focused solutions to reduce the utilization of health care resources and optimize quality of care for public and commercial clients. KePRO is URAC accredited in both health utilization management and case management. For more information, visit http://www.kepro.org.

About Lovelace Health Plan

Since 1973, Lovelace Health Plan has worked closely with physicians to design programs and benefits that keep plan members healthy and informed of their choices. Today, Lovelace Health Plan offers a full portfolio of managed-care plans, providing insurance coverage for more than 190,000 people in communities across New Mexico. Its health plans cover more than 2,000 employer groups and thousands of Medicare-eligible individuals and their families. Learn more about Lovelace Health Plan online at www.lovelacehealthplan.com.

About MEDecision

MEDecision offers collaborative health care management solutions that provide a simplified and smart way to manage the health of members and member populations which can improve the quality and affordability of care. Based on state-of-the-art technology, MEDecision's solutions include Alineo™, a collaborative health care management platform for managing case, disease and utilization management and Nexalign™, a collaborative health care information exchange service. MEDecision believes that, in the aggregate, its health care payer customers insure or manage care for approximately one in every six people in the U.S. with health insurance. For more information, please visit www.MEDecision.com.

MEDecision is a trademark of MEDecision, Inc. The MEDecision logo and product names are also trademarks or registered trademarks of MEDecision, Inc. Other product and brand names are trademarks of their respective owners.