Dr. Afzal is a visionary in healthcare innovation, dedicating more than a decade to advancing value-based care models. As the co-founder and CEO of Puzzle Healthcare, he leads a nationally recognized company that specializes in post-acute care coordination and reducing hospital readmissions. Under his leadership, Puzzle Healthcare has garnered praise from several of the nation’s top healthcare systems and ACOs for its exceptional patient outcomes, improved care delivery, and effective reduction in readmission rates.
While there is a significant need and opportunity to address this overall spend with advanced AI tools that predict patient needs and readmission likelihood, intrinsic biases within these algorithms ultimately cause more harm than good and financial savings are being achieved at the expense of patient’s health.
We can and must do better to make sure our smart new tools actually do see the individual – by making them as transparent, unbiased, and compassionate as the caregivers we would want for our own families.
Arbiter’s Anjali Jameson on hospital and payer alignment.
These updated guidelines are a good opportunity for SNFs to change how they operate moving forward. Those who start implementing new policies and objectives soon and begin to operate as one system, rather than prioritizing each outcome separately, will be the ones to see the greatest results.
With more SNFs being penalized and an increasing number of patients being referred to home health care, participating in an ACO may be a strategic solution to improving care coordination, organizational goals, and patient outcomes overall.
Hospital readmissions have a two-fold impact. They not only drive up the cost of care, but they also create a glut of surplus patients in hospitals waiting to be discharged to a limited number of beds at a partner skilled nursing facility.