Humana-Epic effort aims to give better decision support to docs, patients

Humana is collaborating with electronic health records vendor Epic as both entities seek to bring together patients, providers and insurers to advance value-based care.

The organizations will integrate technologies to enhance patient, provider and payer access to health information.

They plan to advance interoperability to promote open communication and information transparency. The goal is to give patients and clinicians real-time access to patients’ medical history, health factors and treatment options with the intent of reducing costs and improving quality and patient satisfaction.

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This will help patients and insurers to weigh outcomes with patients’ medication costs and coverage, according to Alan Wheatley, President at Humana’s retail unit.



“It’s estimated that roughly half of Humana Medicare Advantage members already see a doctor that uses Epic, so we are excited about the number of patients that will benefit from this partnership,” he adds.

As part of the program, Humana will integrate its Real-Time Benefits Check tool, called IntelligentRx, into Epic’s e-prescribing workflow to offer real-time pharmacy data across its network.

When prescribers are offered alternatives available from the IntelligentRx platform, they select the more cost-effective treatment about 40 percent of the time, adds, Scott Greenwell, president of Humana Pharmacy Solutions.

Expected benefits include better tracking of quality measures, aiding physicians making referral decisions at the point of care, improving medication adherence, giving clinicians claims to support monitoring of value-based arrangement performance, and improved timeliness for prior authorization decisions.

The program helps stakeholders work from the same playbook, says Alan Hutchison, vice president of population health at Epic. “The relationship is also about aligning information to reduce the administrative burden on providers and improve quality and transparency for patients,” he notes.