Boston, MA, February 3, 2016 -Chilmark Research’s latest report, 2016 Analytics for Population Health Management Market Trends Report, reveals that vendor solutions are not keeping pace with the accelerating demands of a rapidly transforming industry. While vendors continue to make progress in the functional evolution of their analytics solutions, healthcare organizations (HCOs) struggle with the complexity of their data management requirements and embedding analytical insights into clinical workflows in support of strategic initiatives. This extensive update to the 2014 edition builds on Chilmark’s comprehensive review of available solutions to serve the analytics needs of HCOs to enable their Population Health Management (PHM) strategies. The report also presents a new model for understanding the value chain for clinical analytics across the enterprise.
The most important driver underlying strong growth in data analytics is the move to alternative payment models, often referred to as value-based reimbursement (VBR). Future financial success in the VBR realm requires HCOs to effectively manage risks, utilization and costs while concurrently improving quality and optimizing outcomes. Today, however, HCOs must straddle the two different payment regimes of fee-for-service (FFS) and VBR. Analytics solutions are currently focusing on helping HCOs maximize revenue (hitting quality targets) and leverage traditional FFS reimbursements (closing care gaps). A secondary objective is to help HCOs reduce medical costs (variability) and unnecessary utilization (readmissions reduction and low-acuity, non-emergent utilization).
The report points to an important, ongoing challenge – incorporating analytics into existing workflows. While vendors have made progress with analytics functionality, workflow integration ultimately keeps analytics out of the hands of clinicians who could benefit most from insights at the point of care. Today, clinicians typically exit their EHR, toggling to a clinical portal for analytically-derived insights.
Another notable finding is the relatively rapid progress made by EHR vendors in the last year. Vendors such as Cerner, Epic, and eClinicalWorks have added functionality and seen strong adoption by their customers. Independent vendors are not standing still. They continue to enhance their solutions and acquire new customers, staying one step ahead of the EHR vendors on functionality. EHR vendors, however, hold the advantage of existing customer relationships and often better ability to embed insights into clinician workflow.