Is the ACO strategy right for your organization? Accountable Care Organizations will help you understand the ACO framework and assess your readiness to embark on an ACO strategy. This book provides the structural blueprints, management skills, and cultural tools necessary to implement a successful ACO. Practical advice is bolstered with real world examples of leading healthcare providers that are pioneers in the rapidly changing world of accountable care. This guidebook is designed to facilitate critical conversations and decisions at all stages of the ACO development journey. Explore processes and structures and learn how to implement pilots to shape your own ACO delivery model. Each chapter includes takeaway points and tailored action steps for: (1) organizations interested in exploring the ACO concept, (2) organizations taking the first steps towards an ACO model, and (3) organizations already moving full speed ahead. This book will help you answer these questions and more: What does it take to become an ACO? What steps and actions should your organization take to implement an ACO strategy? How can organizational culture support your move to accountable care? How can you build a business plan to support an ACO strategy? What information technology is needed to implement an ACO strategy? How can an merging ACO best negotiate with third-party payers?

This book reviews quality definition, measurement, improvement, value, and accountability for obesity management. The interplay between quality, cost, access and satisfaction is fully depicted with a goal toward not only fulfilling current standards but also anticipating future needs. A thorough inventory of current best practices in all aspects of obesity care is cataloged with a gap analysis also employed for potential areas of improvement to be road mapped. All chapters are written by experts in their fields and include the most up-to-date scientific and clinical information, take home messages, and questions towards following the requirements of quality certification in obesity management. Quality in Obesity Treatment provides a comprehensive, contemporary review of this field and serves as a valuable resource for Bariatric Surgeons, Primary Care Physicians, Policy Makers, Insurance Administrators, Bariatricians, and any medical specialty interested in obesity quality management with likely candidates coming from GI, endocrinology, cardiology, sleep medicine and orthopedics.

"Accountable Care: Bridging the Health Information Technology Divide, First Edition (Bridging the Divide), touches on many elements of the healthcare industry's technology journey toward more accountable and clinically integrated models of care delivery. The aging US and global population, complexity of the delivery systems, the continuous need for new innovation, and a greater emphasis on improving population health are key factors addressed throughout the text" --Back cover.

This handbook gives profound insight into the main ideas and concepts of integrated care. It offers a managed care perspective with a focus on patient orientation, efficiency, and quality by applying widely recognized management approaches to the field of health care. The handbook also provides international best practices and shows how integrated care does work throughout various health systems. The delivery of health and social care is characterised by fragmentation and complexity in most health systems throughout the world. Therefore, much of the recent international discussion in the field of health policy and health management has focused on the topic of integrated care. “Integrated” acknowledges the complexity of patients ́ needs and aims to meet it by taking into account both health and social care aspects. Changing and improving processes in a coordinated way is at the heart of this approach.