NEWS RELEASE                             
Contact: Bob Johannessen, 225-248-7059
December 10, 2010                                                           

One Answer to Louisiana's Poor Health Rankings
Program to reduce unnecessary hospitalizations garners national kudos

Scott Flowers, MBA/MHA, Project Director eQHealth (far right) is pictured receiving Innovation Award from (left to right): Dennis Wagner, Associate Deputy Director, CMS Office of Clinical Standards and Quality; Lisa McAdams, M.D., M.P.H., Medical Officer and Special Assistant to the Consortium Administrator, Consortium for Quality Improvement and Survey Certification Operations; Paul McGann, M.D., Deputy Chief Medical Officer, CMS Office of Clinical Standards and Quality;Jean Moody-Williams, Director, Quality Improvement Group, CMS Office of Clinical Standards and Quality;Terris King, Deputy Director, CMS Office of Clinical Standards and Quality; Barry Straube, M.D., Director & CMS Chief Medical Officer, CMS Office of Clinical Standards and Quality.

Baton Rouge - Improving Louisiana's health outcomes doesn't have to take years of debate about what new policies to put in place in order to totally remake the health care system. Instead, using proven programs that can be quickly implemented and immediately measured for results, might be a more prudent and practical approach.

That's the message from eQHealth Solutions' President Gary Curtis after the company was recognized by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services for an innovative program that is successfully addressing a perplexing health care problem, unnecessary hospitalizations.

>"It is disheartening to read, again, that Louisiana comes in almost dead last in the most recent America's Health Rankings.  There is plenty of evidence that the individual statistics comprising these rankings can be improved, one by one, through a laser-focused commitment to putting best practices in place," Curtis said.

In the most recent ranking published by the United Health Foundation, Louisiana comes in 47th for preventable hospitalizations. At the same time these rankings were being released, Curtis and eQHealth were being recognized by CMS for its program that is addressing this specific indicator of poor health.

Termed Care Transitions, this Baton Rouge-based project was cited by CMS last week as one of the nation's most innovative health care projects. The Special Recognition Award for Innovation was presented at the CMS QualityNet conference in Baltimore.

A key intervention of the eQHealth program is the pairing of a patient with a health coach. This intervention is designed to ensure the patient recovers from his or her hospitalization and will not need to be readmitted for the same condition in the following month.

Unnecessary hospital readmissions are a health care problem affecting 17.6% of all Medicare patients and costing $12 billion annually, according to a 2005 CMS study. In addition to the statistics reported in America's Health Rankings, the 2007 Commonwealth Fund State Scorecard reported Louisiana as having the highest 30-day readmission rate in the country for Medicare patients at 23.8%.

Curtis said Care Transitions is one example of a focused commitment to improving one key indicator. He cited statistics from the health rankings report for Louisiana's high immunization coverage and ready access to early prenatal care.

"This was not always the case. It wasn't until several years ago the Department of Health and Hospitals made a commitment to improving immunization rates and creating the LaMOMS program that increased access to prenatal care. By putting the weight and force of the agency behind these efforts, outstanding results were achieved," Curtis said.

Curtis said the success of the Care Transitions project is the result of the commitments made by hospitals, home care agencies, nursing homes and other health care providers.

"The Baton Rouge community came together in a spirit of cooperation to find a solution to a costly health care problem," Curtis added. "The result? Patients are learning more about their post-hospitalization needs and, thus, can take better care of themselves."

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