700: The amount of primary care clinics Walgreens is planning to open up in the next five years through a partnership with VillageMD, the home-based primary care group. The clinics will be called Village Medical at Walgreens and will integrate digitally with Walgreens to simplify the prescription process. The first clinics will be opened in Texas and Arizona, and more than half will be in government-designated medically underserved geographic areas.
Match Game: Like a page out eHarmony’s book, a former teacher we chatted with this week has plucked 24 college kids in New England, started training them in applied behavioral analysis, and created a school service targeting the cash-paying population of families who are bracing for a full year of at-home education. Like a dating match site, the entrepreneurial educator will match the parent’s need with the college kid’s skills. Seeking a male who’s got some base training in working with kids on the autism spectrum but also can help an 11th grader with SAT prep and show a 6-year-old how to paint like da Vinci? We got that. Need a female with basketball experience who’s strong in algebra and essay writing? We got that. Zoom meet-and-greets will be used, and then a discussion about whether the college student will educate “remote only,” visit the family daily or 3x a week, or perhaps “live in.”
Telehealth Avalanche: UPMC, the Pennsylvania health system, averaged about 9,500 telehealth visits a day by the end of April, up from just 250 a day before then. A separate study found that about a third of tele-visits during the crisis have been specifically for mental health reasons but in discussions with pediatrics, geriatricians, and other PCPs, the real number is probably closer to 70%. “I can’t think of a visit this week where my patients haven’t talked about their mental health, depression, mood, and anxiety in some way,” Ally Tiascentino, PA, told us in an interview. “It’s no longer the PHQ-9 that is driving our discussion.”
Ohio Behavioral Model Emerges: Managed care plan CareSource is partnering with Child and Family Health Collaborative of Ohio to develop a new model of community-based behavioral health care for children in Ohio, including enhancement of telepsych services. The focus of the partnership will be on keeping children and their caregivers engaged in behavioral health services during the pandemic and into the 2020 school year. In Ohio, more than half of CareSource Medicaid members are under 18 years old. Tia Marcel Moretti, CareSource Ohio Director of Behavioral Health, says “combining forces will allow us to explore new, creative ways to achieve better health outcomes.”
Long-Term Care Gap: Funding decreases in recent years have left nursing homes poorly equipped to handle the pandemic, according to a panel AARP convened earlier this month. Dr. Rachel Werner, Executive Director of the Leonard Davis Institute of Health Economics at UPenn, says many nursing homes in poor neighborhoods receive less funding and were thus less equipped to deal with the pandemic while Dr. Morgan Katz, a Professor of Medicine at Johns Hopkins who focuses on infection control, says new policies enacted for nursing homes really need to be guided by available resources. “No mandate that is given should be unfunded.” Dr. Grace Jenq, who specializes in geriatric and palliative medicine at the University of Michigan, says nursing homes affiliated with academic centers “stand a better chance of being able to test rapidly.”
Women Rise Up: Getting mammogram results while still at your appointment is one feature of a new comprehensive women’s health center in Michigan opening at the end of August. Spectrum Health Women’s Health & Wellness Center will include a broad range of services, including preventive care, pelvic floor concerns, incontinence, menopause symptoms, bone health, preventive heart health, nutrition and breast health. The center will support virtual visits and will have space for classes on topics like health eating and managing stress.
Walk the Line: Independence Blue Cross in Pennsylvania conducted a nine-month study of over 460 employees from six Independence employer groups that shows an enhanced walking program led to weight loss and improvements in mood, energy levels and overall feelings of well-being. Independence offers a variety of walking and weight loss programs to employer groups, including “Maintain, Don’t Gain!” — a program to help employees avoid weight gain during the holidays, and “Losers R Winners,” a weight loss challenge program that includes cash or other prizes. Earlier this year, we reported that several Blue plan executives say they are appointing Chief Executive Officers who will head up more initiatives like this.
Gene Therapy Innovation: These therapies offer hope for many patients where previously there was none, but it comes at a steep price. Zolgensma’s price alone was listed at $2.1 million per treatment, making it the most expensive drug in the world. But there are a range of value-based models emerging from Cigna, CVS, Harvard Pilgrim, Aetna, Anthem, and manufacturers to help figure out a path forward. What’s interesting is to see so much creativity in payment models out of the gate. It usually takes years, decades even, for the health insurers and health system to collaborate like this. The full report comes next week.