TAFTON, PA — Lauren Hughes, MD, Pennsylvania’s deputy secretary for health innovation at the PA Department of Health, will be the keynote speaker at the annual State Health Improvement …
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TAFTON, PA — Lauren Hughes, MD, Pennsylvania’s deputy secretary for health innovation at the PA Department of Health, will be the keynote speaker at the annual State Health Improvement Plan (SHIP) breakfast on August 3 at Silver Birches in Tafton. Wayne Memorial is the lead fiscal agent for the local SHIP partnership.
Hughes creates and leads statewide strategies to improve health and healthcare delivery for all Pennsylvanians, with a focus on initiatives combating the opioid and heroin epidemic and transforming rural health care delivery. The title of her SHIP presentation is “A Path Forward for Strengthening Rural Hospitals and their Community Connections.” She is expected to touch on a new payment structure called the Rural Health Model, which Wayne Memorial Hospital is considering. Sometimes called global budgeting, the Rural Health Model provides hospitals with a fixed amount of funding for a fixed period of time from multiple payers (public and private), rather than fee-for-service rates for individual services or cases. It’s intended to provide a stable stream of revenue to hospitals that are often struggling financially. Hospitals can save money if they are able to reduce their expected expenses. One way to do that is to prevent hospital readmissions and focus on preventive care.
Wayne Memorial CEO David Hoff agreed, stating “This method of payment incentivizes us to invest in population health almost as much as we devote to healing. It’s a whole new way of operating, and we’re excited about the next steps. It goes hand in hand with what the hospital and our community health centers have been doing under the Keystone Accountable Care model for our Medicare patients, where we are similarly incentivized to implement measures to help keep people healthy.”
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