9 Ways to Reduce Hospital Readmissions from Hospital Executives

Successful hospitals share the strategies they have used to reduce readmissions.

Successful hospitals share the strategies they have used to reduce readmissions.

Encouraging patients to follow up with their primary care doctors within one week of discharge is key to Tandigm Health’s strategy of reducing readmissions. The population health organization based in Conshohocken, Pennsylvania, discovered that high-risk patients who followed up with their primary care physician (PCP) within seven days had a 10%, 30-day readmission rate. Those who didn’t see their PCP in that same timeframe had a 17% readmission rate, despite both groups having nearly identical LACE index scores. The LACE index identifies patients who are at risk for readmission or death within 30 days of discharge.

“Our value-based program is designed to engage doctors by providing meaningful incentives that ultimately reward them for improvements in the quality and cost of healthcare,” says Ken Goldblum, MD, chief medical officer, Tandigm Health. “As our data began to show the benefits of following up with a PCP post-discharge, we added a metric to our incentive plan and started to reward physicians for following up with their patients within seven days of a hospitalization.”

With that incentive in place, the hospital’s follow-up rate increased from 25% to 54% in just one year.