Alex Azar Joins AbsoluteCare's Board of Directors

Former U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Lends His Expertise

COLUMBIA, Md., Jan. 6, 2023 /PRNewswire/ -- AbsoluteCare, a concierge, PCP-driven care model serving the most medically complex and compromised members, is pleased to welcome the 24^th U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS), Alex Azar, to our board.

As HHS Secretary, Azar oversaw 85,000 employees and achieved transformative healthcare results on many initiatives such as promoting transparency in healthcare goods and services, enabling collaborative care models, and expanding telehealth and rural healthcare access for many Americans. Most notably, his COVID-19 actions included Operation Warp Speed, which dramatically accelerated the creation and distribution of COVID-19 vaccines and therapeutics.

Known for offering care that goes beyond medicine™, AbsoluteCare focuses on the whole person, improving the quality of life for our members and a reduction in healthcare costs for Medicaid and Medicare payers. Secretary Azar is a natural fit, with the expertise to help AbsoluteCare expand efforts and prioritize specific healthcare initiatives.

"We are thrilled to have a luminary and transformative healthcare leader such as Secretary Azar, to help  guide our expansion into additional underserved communities," said Michael P. Radu, CEO, AbsoluteCare. "With his broad purview, Secretary Azar also offers us unique insights to help us scale our whole-person care model that addresses behavioral health, substance use disorder, and other chronic conditions along with deficits in social determinants of health."

"So much of the healthcare system rewards transactional services, encouraging treatments that are not correlated with improved outcomes," said Secretary Azar. "That's why the work of AbsoluteCare is so critical. To date, there is no other organization as advanced and impactful to vulnerable populations as AbsoluteCare."

Secretary Azar is former president of the U.S. division of Eli Lilly and Company, a global pharmaceutical leader. He was also Deputy Secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, where he was chief operating officer and second in command. He currently serves on several boards and committees, including the National Institute for Healthcare Management Foundation Advisory Board and the Healthcare Leadership Council. He is a part-time adjunct professor of business and Senior Executive-in-Residence at the University of Miami Herbert Business School. He graduated summa cum laude with a B.A. in government and economics from Dartmouth and earned a J.D. degree from Yale Law School.

Headquartered in Columbia, Maryland, AbsoluteCare is a leading value-based integrated healthcare provider. We go beyond medicine™ to provide comprehensive and preventive care to the most vulnerable populations. AbsoluteCare offers concierge health services using a risk-bearing, PCP-driven care model. We treat the most clinically complex members of the communities we serve—many of whom face behavioral health, substance use, and SDoH challenges. AbsoluteCare tends exclusively to the needs of the high-risk population who persistently represent a disproportionate amount of unnecessary utilization and cost, regardless of whether they are engaged with other PCPs. We deliver this care in our Comprehensive Care Centers and in the communities we serve. In over 20 years, AbsoluteCare has achieved unprecedented outcomes by addressing medical and psychosocial issues, and life's hardships that exacerbate chronic health conditions and complicate access to care. AbsoluteCare currently operates in five markets: Baltimore and Prince George's County, MD; New Orleans, LA; and Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, PA. We have treated tens of thousands of chronically ill individuals, living up to the mission of providing care that goes beyond medicine™.

For more information, visit absolutecare.com.

Contact: Lauren Cutruzzula
410-504-6971
[email protected]

SOURCE AbsoluteCare