UW Medicine Named 2019 Acclaim Award Recipient

Alexandria, VA – AMGA announced UW Medicine as the recipient of its 2019 Acclaim Award. The Acclaim Award, supported by AMGA Foundation, rewards the nation’s premier healthcare delivery organizations that are high-performing and that are bringing their organization closer to the ideal delivery model―one that is measurably improving the quality and value of care, improving patient experience and outcomes, continuously learning and innovating, and improving population health. Lexington Clinic was also announced as this year’s Acclaim Award honoree.

“AMGA is excited to present this year’s Acclaim Award to UW Medicine for the notable strides they’ve taken to measurably improve care quality and outcomes and reduce costs,” said John Kennedy, M.D., AMGA chief medical officer and AMGA Foundation president. “Through this award, we hope to highlight the tactics UW Medicine used and the outcomes they achieved to help inspire other providers seeking to improve their own performance.”

“We are honored to receive this prestigious award,” said Paul Ramsey, M.D., UW Medicine chief executive officer. “It is a tribute to the innovation and dedication of our care teams, who are steadfastly working to improve the quality and value of care and to make UW Medicine a national leader for care transformation.”

UW Medicine

UW Medicine is an academic health system affiliated with the University of Washington in Seattle. With a workforce of more than 27,000, including 4,670 clinicians at 4 hospitals, UW Medicine is one of the Pacific Northwest’s largest health systems. UW Medicine’s application highlighted their strategies to measurably improve outcomes, lower costs, reduce inequity, and better manage populations of patients. Notable strategies included:

  • Implementing a system-wide, high-risk care management program
  • Empaneling nearly 400,000 primary care patients to more than 450 primary care providers (PCPs) across 38 clinics
  • Deploying an organizational “Healthcare Equity Blueprint”
  • Launching 79 standardization projects over 20 service areas
  • Aligning compensation and incentives for clinicians in relation to their care transformation strategies
  • Applying an outcomes-based approach to deliver high-quality palliative care
  • Creating Population Approach to Health (PATH) programs for intensive management of patient chronic conditions in coordination with PCPs
  • Recognizing exercise as a vital sign
  • Integrating a health technology assessment program (“Smart Innovation”) into the purchasing process
  • Linking patient-reported outcomes data into the clinical workflow
  • Building a post-acute care (PAC) network to improve quality, experience and value across 14 skilled nursing facilities.
  • Scaling up an eConsult program to 14 specialties as part of a telehealth initiative to improved access and patient experience

For more details on UW Medicine’s initiative, click here.

Lexington Clinic

Lexington Clinic is the largest multi-specialty medical group in Central Kentucky. It employs more than 200 providers, representing 30 specialties, and 1,000 support staff, who provide care for more than 600,000 patient visits per year. Like UW Medicine, Lexington Clinic’s application highlighted strategies it took to improve care quality and lower costs. It was especially lauded for its “Direct-to-Employer” partnership program. Notable strategies included:

  • Offering direct contracts arrangements with regional and national organizations
  • Developing a patient navigation program specifically for patients of organizations with direct contracts
  • Using care managers as liaisons between physicians and navigators
  • Participating in quality programs, such as AMGA’s own Diabetes: Together 2 Goal® campaign, Analytics for Improvement, and Measure Up/Pressure Down hypertension campaign. They also participate in Medicare’s Bundled Payments for Care Initiative (BPCI) and Merit-based Incentive Payment System (MIPS)
  • Placing greater emphasis on monitoring and preventatively treated patients with high- and rising-risk chronic conditions
  • Expanding care coordination capabilities to help patient’s navigate healthcare system and treatment options
  • Increasing use of healthcare informatics to identify patients with unidentified chronic conditions
  • Developing shared savings arrangements
  • Converting to a value-based compensation system

For more details on Lexington Clinic’s initiative, click here.

UW Medicine will be presenting their award-winning initiatives at the AMGA 2019 Annual Conference, March 27-30, in National Harbor, MD. Press passes for this event are available. If interested, please contact Matt Clarke by email or by phone at 703.838.0099 ext. 365.

###

About the Acclaim Award
AMGA’s prestigious Acclaim Award honors organizations that are meeting the IOM Aims for Improvement and are taking the necessary steps to become a High-Performing Health System™ as defined by the AMGA. The award highlights the continued research and investigation toward finding the finest models of medical management, coordination of care delivery, and a systemic approach to improving the patient experience. More information on the Acclaim Award process and criteria can be found here.

###

About AMGA Foundation
AMGA Foundation is AMGA’s philanthropic arm that enables medical groups and other organized systems of care to consistently improve health and health care. AMGA Foundation serves as a catalyst, connector and collaborator for translating the evidence of what works best in improving health and health care in everyday practice. 

About AMGA
AMGA is a trade association leading the transformation of health care in America. Representing multispecialty medical groups and integrated systems of care, we advocate, educate, innovate, and empower our members to deliver the next level of high performance health. AMGA is the national voice promoting awareness of our members’ recognized excellence in the delivery of coordinated, high quality, high-value care. More than 175,000 physicians practice in our member organizations, delivering care to one in three Americans.

About UW Medicine
UW Medicine is one of the top-rated academic medical systems in the world. With a mission to improve the health of the public, UW Medicine educates the next generation of physicians and scientists, leads one of the world’s largest and most comprehensive biomedical research programs, and provides outstanding care to patients from across the globe. The UW School of Medicine faculty is second in the nation in federal research grants and contracts with $850.6 million in total revenue (fiscal year 2017) according to the Association of American Medical Colleges. For more information on UW Medicine, click here.

About Lexington Clinic
Lexington Clinic is Central Kentucky’s largest multi-specialty medical group and a leader in population health and employer-based healthcare solution. Lexington Clinic has been serving the region since 1920 and cares for nearly 3,000 patients daily with more than 200 providers in 25 locations. For more information about Lexington Clinic, please visit LexingtonClinic.com or you can follow them on Facebook.

Advertisement

Media Contact:

Sharon Grace
Chief Communications Officer
703.838.0033 ext. 393
sgrace@amga.org
Advertisement