New relationship expands care management support for Lifespan patients, provides incentives for high-value care and offers an important new choice in the local market
(Providence, RI) Lifespan, Rhode Island’s leading provider of primary care, hospital and specialty care services, and Commonwealth Care Alliance (CCA), a national, multi-state healthcare organization with proven expertise in complex care coordination and delivery, announced today that they have reached an agreement that will provide CCA Rhode Island members with access to Lifespan’s comprehensive system of hospitals, behavioral health services and primary care networks.
CCA currently offers two Medicare Advantage plans and one Dual Eligible Special Needs plan in Rhode Island. All of CCA’s Rhode Island plans are available to Lifespan patients. The plans are designed to support a holistic approach to care that addresses both chronic conditions and multiple social or medical health needs. In particular, the plans are designed to support dually eligible Medicare and Medicaid beneficiaries, who qualify as high-need based on income or health status, and often live with multiple chronic conditions, physical or behavioral health disabilities, severe mental illness, and social determinants of health needs, including food and housing insecurity.
“The Lifespan team has a long history of fostering relationships with partners that share our commitment to identifying innovative ways to provide outstanding community-based care. We are confident that Commonwealth Care Alliance shares our values and can extend the impact we have in supporting our patients,” said G. Alan Kurose, MD, Lifespan senior vice president of primary care and population health, and Coastal Medical president. “CCA has a strong track record for quality, creative programs addressing social determinants of health and focus on addressing disparities in care.”
CCA has been active in Rhode Island since late 2020, building a network of clinical team members and administrative support personnel who provide comprehensive member management services, with a focus on preventive health/wellness, chronic care management, social networks, behavioral health and specialty care needs. CCA officially launched its Medicare Advantage and Dual Eligible Special Needs plans in Rhode Island in January 2022.
“We are excited by this new partnership with Lifespan; not only are we collaborating with a mission-aligned organization and expanding the reach of our care model, together CCA and Lifespan are creating more choice in healthcare for individuals with significant needs who have traditionally been offered extremely limited options,” said CCA Rhode Island General Manager Corey McCarty. “We look forward to collaborating with the primary care physicians, behavioral health providers and other clinical team members in the Lifespan system to ensure Rhode Islanders across the state receive high-quality, coordinated care that best meets their needs.”
Informed by its roots as a provider organization, CCA’s uncommon care® model is at the core of its mission of improving the health and well-being of people with significant needs by innovating, coordinating, and providing the highest quality, individualized care. As part of their new relationship, Lifespan and CCA expect to collaborate on a value-based contract model that provides incentives for delivering high-quality care and improves patient outcomes.
CCA is committed to working collaboratively with its members to improve care; with a 92% patient engagement rate in 2021, CCA reduced long-term acute care admissions by 40% and reduced inpatient psychiatric and substance use disorder days by 20%[1]. In addition, CCA offers a diverse suite of programs to address disparities in social determinants of health, and unmet behavioral health and mental health needs.
“At a time when we are collectively focused on addressing disparities in health, making the healthcare system – including behavioral health services – more accessible and improving the health of our communities, CCA’s holistic approach is what Rhode Island residents need,” said Dr. Kurose. “I am confident that Lifespan’s providers and patients alike will embrace this new option in the market.”
Over the next three months, Lifespan and CCA will undertake a comprehensive outreach effort to ensure all primary care physicians and community partners are familiar with CCA and the new option it provides.
###
About Lifespan
Formed in 1994, Lifespan is a not-for-profit health system based in Providence, R.I. comprised of three teaching hospitals of The Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University: Rhode Island Hospital and its Hasbro Children’s Hospital; The Miriam Hospital; and Bradley Hospital, the nation’s first psychiatric hospital for children; Newport Hospital, a community hospital offering a broad range of health services; Gateway Healthcare, the state’s largest provider of community behavioral health care; Lifespan Physician Group, the largest multi-specialty practice in Rhode Island; and Coastal Medical, a primary care driven medical practice. Lifespan teaching hospitals are among the country’s top recipients of research funding from the National Institutes of Health. The hospitals received $98 million in external research funding in fiscal 2020. All Lifespan-affiliated partners are charitable organizations that depend on support from the community to provide programs and services.
About Commonwealth Care Alliance
Based in Boston, Commonwealth Care Alliance® (CCA) is a multi-state integrated care system influencing innovative models of complex care nationwide. Mission-based and person-centered, CCA focuses on sustainable and evidence-based healthcare breakthroughs that improve the health and well-being of people with significant needs, and advocates for affordable, high-quality, and cost-effective policies that lead to healthcare equity for individuals who need it most. The CCA care model is consistently recognized as one of the best in the country at finding and engaging traditionally hard-to-reach individuals—since 2016*, consumers have consistently rated CCA One Care as one of the best for overall experience and CMS rated CCA Senior Care Options 5 out of 5 stars for 2022. CCA recently began a multi-year, mission-aligned geographic diversification growth strategy to extend its proven care model throughout the United States, and now serves roughly 61,000 individuals and operates health plans in Massachusetts, Rhode Island, California and Michigan. Learn more about CCA at https://www.commonwealthcarealliance.org/about-us/ or follow CCA on Twitter and LinkedIn.
*Based on the 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020 and 2021 Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (CAHPS) surveys.
[1] Combined CCA One Care and Senior Care Options rate per 1,000 Massachusetts members.