Colorado Beacon's Patrick Gordon to discuss payment reform at AHIP summit

Three-year pilot program will foster payer collaboration and advance primary care

GRAND JUNCTION, Colo., Aug. 30, 2012 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Patrick Gordon, director of government programs for Rocky Mountain Health Plans and Colorado Beacon Consortium (CBC) program director, will talk about payment reform at AHIP's Summit on Payment Reform and Delivery Transformation.

The Summit, slated for Sept. 11-12 at the Capital Hilton Hotel in Washington, D.C., will feature thought leaders from around the country. Gordon's talk, at 3:15 p.m. on the first day, is entitled "Medicaid and Community-based Payment Reform Collaboratives."

The CBC is in an especially strong position to advance reforms in the context of Medicaid, Gordon noted, and added that, while Colorado's Accountable Care Collaborative (ACC) program is still new, it's beginning to generate positive results. Rocky Mountain Health Plans in one of five Regional Care Collaborative Organizations serving patients and providers within this program. Moreover, in June Colorado lawmakers enacted H.B.12-1281. The legislation creates the opportunity for Medicaid payment-reform projects within the ACC framework.

In addition, Rocky Mountain Health Plans is embarking on a payment reform initiative with Collaborative Family Healthcare Association and the University of Colorado Denver (UCD) department of family medicine. That pilot seeks to create a sustainable, non-fee-for-service payment model to integrate behavioral health and primary care. Details about the initiative are available in a new issue brief, Tear down this wall: Rocky Mountain Health Plans embarks on a mission to bring together behavioral health and primary care, available for download at http://www.coloradobeaconconsortium.org/2012/08/30/tear-down-this-wall.

"We must implement better ways to care for our most vulnerable citizens–and to pay for that care," Gordon said. "Good intentions are not enough. No one–not the patients, the providers, employers, payers or taxpayers–is served by piecemeal approaches. We must create and put into place models that are sustainable over the long term. Colorado Beacon Consortium partners are developing solutions that will allow us to do just that. I look forward to sharing our efforts with my colleagues at AHIP, and I am excited to hear what other leaders are doing."

About the Colorado Beacon Consortium

The Colorado Beacon Consortium is made up of executive-level representation from four mission-driven, not-for-profit, Western Colorado-based organizations, all of which have nationally acknowledged track records of coordination to achieve superior outcomes. They are Mesa County Independent Physicians' Practice Association, Quality Health Network, Rocky Mountain Health Plans and St. Mary's Regional Medical Center. The Colorado Beacon Consortium's mission is to optimize the efficiency, quality and performance of our health care system, and integrate the delivery of care and use of clinical information to improve community health. The geographic focus of the Consortium's activities includes the Colorado counties of Mesa, Delta, Montrose, Garfield, Gunnison, Pitkin and Rio Blanco. To learn more, visit www.coloradobeaconconsortium.org.

SOURCE Colorado Beacon Consortium