Humana Value-Based Care Harrogate
When Humana first came to this family practice in Harrogate, Tennessee, the physician wanted nothing to do with it. His quality reports were covered in red, the measures felt unfair, and he walked Humana's team out of his office more than once, on one visit while they were trying to hand him a provider rewards check.
We produced this piece for Humana in 2019. It follows the relationship from that standoff to a working partnership: Humana's medical director driving in from Knoxville, an EMR used to find the sickest patients, and a community that started seeing the doctor before they were sick.
Most provider testimonials sound alike. A story where the subject starts out as the skeptic is worth more, and the edit is built around that turn.
About This Project
Client: Humana
Practice: Family Medical Clinic of Harrogate
Type: Healthcare video, provider testimonial, value-based care
Location: Harrogate, TN
Services: Production, interviews, editing
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Video Transcript:
It's important for me to come back home. I had trained at Mayo Clinic, and when I came and saw the quality of health care here, it wasn't nearly what I had seen other places. I thought this would be a great place to come back and introduce great quality care.
When I did come in contact with Humana, man, I did feel as though they were my enemies. Giving us all these forms about HEDIS measures and giving us Stars reports, and our Stars reports were all red. It looked like a stoplight all the way down the paper. Terrible.
A lot of these things I didn't see myself being able to control, so I didn't see that it was exactly fair to be graded on those things. I knew our staff was working hard, and I knew that I was working hard, but I wasn't able to make the distinction between those numbers and what we were actually doing. And so when they first started here, I probably kicked them out two or three times. Walked out a few times.
The day that he kicked me out of the office, I'd actually presented him with a check for provider rewards. He refused the check. He did not want to take the check. That was kind of our turning point. When I gave the check back, it's not about the money, it's actually about taking care of people. And I said, you know, I want to talk to your medical director.
He came to Harrogate, Tennessee, from Knoxville, and next thing I know, he was sitting right where we are today.
Once I understood where Humana was coming from, I understood that they want the same thing I want. We wanted the patient to be as well cared for as possible. With our new EMR systems, we're able to target those populations that are the sickest, and we're able to pull those in. We're able to see those people more often.
It was not just changing our practice, but changing the culture of our patients and our community: that coming to the doctor when you're well is not a bad thing, and making sure that you're doing your colonoscopies and mammograms and taking care of yourself is a good thing. And we've actually caught, I think to date, about 57 or 58 cancers in the last year.
Value-based care incorporates everybody on my team. It truly affected every part of our practice for the good.
What people don't realize is, when you adopt this value-based system, it makes every other practice in the area better because you exist. And ultimately the patient flourishes in that, and part of that is Humana has helped me do my job, and maybe be better at my job.