Kaiser Permanente, Johns Hopkins Medicine Announce Enhanced Strategic Collaboration

ROCKVILLE, Md., July 29, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- Kaiser Permanente and Johns Hopkins Medicine today announced plans to strengthen the successful collaboration between the two health care organizations. With the new agreement, Kaiser Permanente and Johns Hopkins Medicine will expand ways to deliver quality care by sharing evidence-based best practices, advancing population health programs, collaborating on education and research endeavors, and exploring how the organizations can work together to create better health care models for consumers and their communities.

"Kaiser Permanente is committed to providing high-quality health care and service, while also leading the nation in making health care more affordable for Americans," says Kaiser Permanente Chairman and CEO Bernard J. Tyson. "This enhanced collaboration with Johns Hopkins will help us deliver on that commitment and continue to meet the evolving health needs and expectations of our members, patients and customers."

"Health care today requires partnership among forward-thinking health care organizations," says Paul B. Rothman, M.D., dean of the medical faculty and CEO of Johns Hopkins Medicine. "Through a strategic collaboration with Kaiser Permanente, we will be able to cultivate the human and intellectual capital found in both organizations to significantly improve the safety and quality of care while enhancing the patient experience."

"Combining the expertise of the nation's leading integrated care delivery organization with the expertise of the country's leading academic medical center will allow us both to provide even better quality and service to their patients," says Robert Pearl, M.D., executive director and CEO of the Mid-Atlantic Permanente Medical Group. "As the United States works to improve its health care system, this partnership will provide powerful and important insights into how care can be provided to patients in new and innovative ways."

The agreement between the two health care organizations will initially focus on:

• Sharing best practices and leveraging electronic medical records to accommodate the growing need among providers and patients to access clinical information quickly and efficiently.
• Strengthening the relationship between Kaiser Permanente and Suburban Hospital, a member of Johns Hopkins Medicine, by combining their collective expertise to create an advanced model of care.
• Bringing care into the home to meet the evolving needs of patients by exploring and leveraging technology to deliver personalized medicine.
• Building on the existing collaboration between Kaiser Permanente and Johns Hopkins' Armstrong Institute for Patient Safety and Quality to advance the patient experience and improve treatment outcomes while reducing costs.
• Pursuing opportunities to develop educational programs and research-based best practices that benefit the overall health of the people in the communities we serve.

"This new agreement builds on the relationship Kaiser Permanente of the Mid-Atlantic States and Johns Hopkins Medicine have had for more than 15 years," says Ronald R. Peterson, president of The Johns Hopkins Hospital and Health System and executive vice president of Johns Hopkins Medicine.  "Care providers from both organizations successfully have been working together to deliver high-quality care. This is demonstrated through the Kaiser collaboration with Suburban Hospital in Maryland, where physicians from both care teams work side by side to ensure the best patient outcomes."

"Working more closely with Johns Hopkins Medicine will help us deliver an innovative care experience for our members that will translate into quality care that's also affordable," says Kim Horn, president of Kaiser Permanente of the Mid-Atlantic States. "This strategic collaboration will facilitate additional population health research and innovative practices benefiting both individual patients and the larger community."

"The collaboration between Johns Hopkins Medicine and Kaiser Permanente will escalate medical solutions from the bench to the bedside," says Brian Gragnolati, senior vice president of the Johns Hopkins Health System. "Together we can find solutions that provide patients with value-based care."

About Kaiser Permanente
Kaiser Permanente is committed to helping shape the future of health care. We are recognized as one of America's leading health care providers and not-for-profit health plans. Founded in 1945, our mission is to provide high-quality, affordable health care services and to improve the health of our members and the communities we serve. We currently serve approximately 9.3 million members in eight states and the District of Columbia. Care for members and patients is focused on their total health and guided by their personal physicians, specialists and team of caregivers. Our expert and caring medical teams are empowered and supported by industry-leading technology advances and tools for health promotion, disease prevention, state-of-the-art care delivery and world-class chronic disease management. Kaiser Permanente is dedicated to care innovations, clinical research, health education and the support of community health. For more information, go to: kp.org/share.

About Kaiser Permanente of the Mid-Atlantic States
Kaiser Permanente of the Mid-Atlantic States region, headquartered in Rockville, Maryland, provides and coordinates complete health care services for more than 510,000 members through 29 medical centers in Maryland, Virginia and Washington, D.C. Founded in 1980, Kaiser Permanente of the Mid-Atlantic States is a total health organization comprising Kaiser Foundation Health Plan of the Mid-Atlantic States Inc. and the Mid-Atlantic Permanente Medical Group, P.C., an independent medical group that features more than 1,000 physicians. Kaiser Permanente of the Mid-Atlantic States was ranked in the nation's 20 top commercial health plans and 10 top Medicare health plans — and was named the number one commercial and Medicare plan for Maryland, Virginia and Washington, D.C. — in the National Committee for Quality Assurance's Private Health Insurance Plan Rankings 2013-2014. For more information about Kaiser Permanente of the Mid-Atlantic States, visit kp.org or follow us on Twitter @KPMidAtlantic.

About Johns Hopkins Medicine
Johns Hopkins Medicine (JHM), headquartered in Baltimore, Maryland, is a $7 billion integrated global health enterprise and one of the leading health care systems in the United States. JHM unites physicians and scientists of the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine with the organizations, health professionals and facilities of The Johns Hopkins Hospital and Health System. JHM's vision, "Together, we will deliver the promise of medicine," is supported by its mission to improve the health of the community and the world by setting the standard of excellence in medical education, research and clinical care. Diverse and inclusive, JHM educates medical students, scientists, health care professionals and the public; conducts biomedical research; and provides patient-centered medicine to prevent, diagnose and treat human illness. JHM operates six academic and community hospitals, four suburban health care and surgery centers, and more than 30 primary health care outpatient sites. The Johns Hopkins Hospital, opened in 1889, has been ranked number one in the nation by U.S. News & World Report for 22 years of the survey's 25 year history, most recently in 2013. For information about JHM, its clinical programs or for help in choosing a personal physician, call 410-955-5000 or visit www.hopkinsmedicine.org.

For more information:  
Che Parker, 301-816-6836
[email protected] 
twitter.com/KPMidAtlantic

Lisa Broadhead, 703-927-6947
[email protected]
hopkinsmedicine.org

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SOURCE Kaiser Permanente