Does your doctor take a proactive approach toward disease prevention or
does he/she just wait for you or your care recipient to show symptoms of a
possibly fatal disease? Disease prevention should be at the top of every
health care professionals ballot to keep patients as healthy as possible
and eliminate the time and hassle of frequent doctors visits, extended
hospital stays and increased use of prescription medication. It seems
logical that preventative measures through educating patients would be
widely used within the health care industry but they haven’t been. The
Health Management Institute (HMI), a collaborative effort of several
managed care associates, is working to bring educational materials about
disease prevention and management to health care professionals in order to
eliminate the entire cost of treatment for patients before it begins.
The American Association of Integrated Healthcare
Delivery Systems, American Association of Managed Care Nurses, American
College of Managed Care Medicine, National Association of Managed Care
Physicians, and Women in Managed Care comprise the diverse team of care
professionals of the Health Management Institute. These united
associations offer a plethora of experience in health management to
develop resources, publications and innovative programs to educate the
health care industry about preventing and managing diseases like diabetes
and asthma. HMI houses a decision-making council comprised of one member
of each association.
HMI is looking to implement programs such as: phone
consultations, Internet questions and answers, prescription hotlines and
other methods to keep patients as healthy and happy as possible. The
concept of preventative health management is sensible but difficult to
initialize.
“We need to convince all sectors of the market, including consumers, to
work toward a common goal,” says Laura Bousquet, HMI’s Director of
Communication. No one will deny that the ideas of prevention, demand
management and disease management would reduce costs and increase overall
health and satisfaction. But how do we convince a physician that bearing
the cost of hiring a nurse practitioner to handle phone consultations or
installing a new computer system to correspond with patients via the
Internet will save money in the long run?”
Another challenge according to Laura is the commitment of the patient to
follow the advice of their doctor and invest in vitamins, therapies and
preventative management techniques that will keep them healthy. Currently,
HMI is working on a survey to be distributed to health care professionals
to examine their disease prevention and management practices in order to
overcome these barriers.
Another project by HMI to educate the industry is the
“Health Management Summit 2000: with Hyperlipidemia as a Model.” The
summit is geared specifically toward health care professionals. It is a
two-day conference on November 17th and 18th at the Sheraton National in
Arlington, VA. The First day of the conference will be an overview of
disease management and prevention and the second day will be a
presentation on case management using Hyperlipidemia as a model. The
information given to professionals that attend the conference will in turn
teach them how to educate their patients.
HMI is the first association to take a proactive
approach to keeping patients healthy. It is beneficial for patients to
take an active role in disease prevention, so don’t be afraid to talk to
your doctor about how you or your care recipient can reduce your risk of
developing a life threatening disease. If you would like more information
about the Health Management Institute contact Michele Rodriguez at (804)
747-5823.
Information provided by Laura Bousquet, (804) 527-1905 at the Health
Management Institute.
