Medical Group Strategy for Success
- Catherine M. Zito, FHFMA, CPA, CPC
- Dec 13, 2017
- 2 min read
As the healthcare industry continues to transition to value, health systems are becoming increasingly aware of the impact of their physician enterprises. The physician enterprises serve as the patients’ medical homes and can help drive proper utilization and quality care. Because of the increased focus on quality and requirements that surround value-based models, independent medical practices are unable to take on the added risk and administrative burden that comes with this focus. Health systems are poised to employ physicians and take on the extra administration and management of physician practices.
A recent article in hfm magazine discussed the evolution of the employed medical groups:
We can all identify with these stages of evolution. The challenge today is to determine how to insure that your medical groups are high performance groups. The article describes six key characteristics of high performing groups:
Our experience shows that a governance model is critical and although no single model will work for all organizations, the key is that there is a collective effort of governance among clinicians, administrators and outside experts. Many health systems continue to treat medical groups as independent profit centers. However, a key component for success is having physicians take responsibility for the success of the business and this works best when they see themselves as part of the whole.
Dyad management models that have clear clinical and administrative complimentary goals can lead to successful change management. While many long established group practice models use salary based compensation models, we have found that incorporating a components of productivity and quality is best.
With today’s millennial providers it is important to be open to flexible work schedules and work environment to avoid the costly consequences of provider turnover. Finally, team-based care models are the key to high performance in the future. A collaborative model that incorporates the patient, provider, mid-levels and staff is the key to the medical group and health system’s success.
For more information of how to develop your medical group strategy for success, contact me at czito@lighthouseha.com.
Reference: hfm “Improving Medical Group performance as Markets Transition to Value”, Bill Eggbeer, Craig Ahrens, David Fairchild, November, 2017