KPMG, Waystar To Connect Social Determinants Of Health Data To Clinical Intelligence Platform

NEW YORK and ATLANTA, May 16, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- Harnessing information tied to social determinants of health (SDOH) can help overcome obstacles to medical treatment and affect outcomes, leading the KPMG Clinical Intelligence (KCI) platform for healthcare organizations to include Waystar's SDOH data to help with coordination of care, the companies announced.

Social, environmental and economic factors – such as transportation, housing, nutrition, and education level – can have a big impact upon medical outcomes.  Healthcare providers are making SDOH a greater priority as their finances are increasingly tied to the quality or other "value-based" measures.

KCI is designed to help healthcare organizations reduce their variation in care by enabling them to identify "pain points" in their performance, such as high length-of-stay or readmission rates that can reflect on quality. The information allows healthcare managers to understand factors behind their organization's performance, track progress on improvement, and gain insight into systemic patterns of care.

"KPMG and Waystar are providing a decision tool for clinicians to gain insights about what happens outside the four walls of a hospital or doctor's office," said Larry Burnett, advisory principal at KPMG LLP, the U.S. audit, tax and advisory firm. "Social factors can have a profound influence upon whether patients are adhering to treatment plans and can overcome barriers to care delivery. Waystar's data fit nicely with KCI, which serves as the foundation for our Care Continuum Optimization program that helps clinicians optimize clinical care and deliver treatment in the most clinically appropriate setting."

"We're thrilled to partner with KPMG to expand our Whole Patient Insight solution," said Matt Hawkins, CEO and board member, Waystar. "Combining Waystar's social determinants data and predictive algorithms with KCI's analytics offers powerful, actionable insights to healthcare providers. By having a more complete view of the patient, providers are empowered to offer more personalized, and often preventative, patient care."

A 2018 Waystar survey found that 68% of consumers had at least some level of SDOH challenges. The most commonly reported issues are financial insecurity and social isolation. Individuals with high social determinants of health stress are 50% more likely to suffer from chronic conditions and 2.3 times more likely to rate their health as "fair" or "poor." Clinicians have started conversations with patients about SDOH: 22% of consumers with social stresses reported having discussed these issues with their physician, and 40% of "high risk" segment consumers have discussed their issues with a provider or their insurance company. 

Microsoft Azure foundation
KCI, which runs on Microsoft's cloud-based Azure platform, will use the SDOH data as a cohort to help healthcare providers manage clinical variation, offering greater insights into the quality of care delivery and the most appropriate care setting for patients.  KPMG has a formal alliance with Microsoft that enables the firm to deliver a cloud-based environment to meet the security needs of providers, payers and life sciences organizations. KPMG's Healthcare Data & Analytics practice has invested in building the "Data Lake" that includes cost, claims, clinical, administrative, census and quality data sets to give real-time insights for client needs.  

About Waystar
Waystar is a leading provider of technology that simplifies the healthcare revenue cycle to improve the financial health of their clients. Waystar's innovative technology allows clients to collect more with less cost and less stress, so they can focus on their goals, patients and communities. Waystar has scored Best in KLAS® every year since 2010 and earned multiple #1 rankings from Black Book™ surveys since 2012. The Waystar platform supports more than 450,000 providers, 750 health systems and hospitals, and 5,000 payers and health plans. For more information, visit waystar.com, or follow @Waystar, on Twitter.

About KPMG LLP
KPMG is one of the world's leading professional services firms, providing innovative business solutions and audit, tax, and advisory services to many of the world's largest and most prestigious organizations.

KPMG LLP is the independent U.S. member firm of KPMG International Cooperative ("KPMG International"). KPMG International's independent member firms have 197,000 professionals working in 154 countries. Learn more at www.kpmg.com/us.

SOURCE KPMG LLP

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