Clear Spring Health wanted to solve a problem that plagues most of the industry: it takes too long to coordinate home health services for members when they are returning home after a hospital stay.
“There was a lot of back and forth via phone between the discharge planners in the hospital and the case managers on our team,” said Lourdes Reyes, vice president of health services at Clear Spring Health. “It could take hours to schedule services, which is not good, especially when a member is already home. It was time consuming and frustrating.”
As a growing Medicare Advantage carrier operating in five states, Clear Spring saw the need for a network management platform to streamline the coordination of services to members, while improving visibility across the many markets they manage from one centralized location.
Earlier this year, Clear Spring partnered with Dina to begin the network management improvement process. To start, the team focused on coordinating home health services for 1,700 members in Illinois and Virginia.
Reyes said the impact was immediate.
“With Dina, the whole process is seamless. Using the platform, we’re referring members to several different agencies at once, and these agencies respond back if they can see the member or not. No phone calls, no back and forth. It’s just a matter of minutes, really,” she said.
“Most of our case managers are nurses and social workers and they are excited because they’re spending less time on clerical work and more time using their knowledge to care for our members,” Reyes said. “Another positive effect is that the frustration level on the team has really gone down.”
As the company grows, she said the team welcomes the opportunity to work more efficiently and make sure they are easy to work with when they engage with partners and members.
“With growth comes more members, more admissions, and more discharge planning,” she said. “When you can use your time to do what we do best, which is case management, you don’t always need to add staff, or the need for additional staff can be reduced.”
Next up for the partnership is expanding to additional markets and adding more services. In the future, Clear Spring sees the opportunity to house all benefits and coordination workflows in the Dina platform including meal delivery, transportation, and one-time or just-in-time contractors.
“Some people were hesitant about learning a new technology, but the platform is very easy to use and it’s been a great experience since we launched,” said Reyes. “We’re excited to continue to add markets and services to the platform.”
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